FEATURED ARTISTS

The Grenning Gallery is pleased to announce our Annual Solo Show for Hunt Slonem!  Please join us and meet the artist at the Opening Reception, Thursday, June 19th from 6:00 to 7:30 pm at 26 Main Street, Sag Harbor, NY, 11963. 

The exhibition hangs through Sunday, July 13th, 2025. There will be a Closing Party on July 12, from 5:00 to 7:00pm. The Grenning Gallery will have Slonem works on display and available for viewing all year round.

The Grenning Gallery was founded to represent painters with a naturalist impulse.  Hunt Slonem despite his distinct style with bold colors and thick brushwork, is no exception. Slonem’s work stands out to us for its spiritual inspiration and steadfast aesthetic. His work is not only grounded in a deep respect and awe of nature, but the man himself is a deeply spiritual person; His artwork is an expression of the life he leads. Slonem nurtures a mystical connection with all that he loves, thus his process of art-making is a ritual in and of itself.

In this year’s show, we have selected a series of wide ranging subjects, yet they are linked by their sensitivity to color and light. His paintings, while they appear simple in subject, are charged with the artist’ joy, love, and pure fascination. The result of this artistic process is paintings that infuse a room with vibrant, positive energy.

In Slonem’s larger works, the populated space of his paintings is both maximalist and minimalist. His iconic repetition birds,  bunnies, and butterflies, often transcends ordinary subjects and transforms into a mesmerizing pattern. By filling a canvas with the same subject in this repetitious way, Slonem’s paintings become a mantra – quieting the senses, captivating the viewer with rich flora and fauna. These paintings are puzzles we can’t help but try to figure out. This approach to his subjects, combined with his many processes of handling the paint, results in truly hypnotic compositions, both aesthetically pleasing and critically engaging.

Hunt Slonem remains nature’s devotee when it comes to the subjects of his paintings. His loyalty to his birds, bunnies, and butterflies give us insight into the mind of the artist, his message, and his process. Playful, joyous, even childlike on the surface, these paintings are warm and welcoming. However, when we look closely and consider why he chooses these animals, we find a profound underpinning to his work. 

The rabbit is a timeless symbol of purity, innocence, and vulnerability. The bird represents freedom and hope, and the butterfly, of course, symbolizes transformation and rebirth. These symbols are so pure they need not be tainted nor obscured; His pop-art adjacent style showcases this message with concise clarity. Such simplicity evokes a natural, instinctual skepticism from viewers, effectively grasping our attention with its boldness. A simple realist painting of a rabbit may not hold the contemporary viewer for very long, but Hunt Slonem’s work is challenging the modern instinct to overlook the natural environment. Instead, he invites us to look deeper.

 During his time studying abroad in tropical climates such as Mexico and Nicaragua, he recalls a single moment when he was in a jungle surrounded by butterflies;

“…Each more iridescent and gorgeous than the next. The memory stayed with me for my whole life, and I just painted them over and over again…Hardly a day goes by that I don’t reference this experience.” explained Slonem.

Hunt Slonem’s dedication to recalling and representing the energy of these experiences is what makes his work so enchanting. Laura Grenning, the founder of Grenning Gallery, has always had an animist understanding of all paintings, since the inception of the gallery in 1998. Grenning believes that the viewer’s feelings when looking at a painting are akin to the feelings that the painter had when they were creating it. In the context of Hunt Slonem, we recognize the pure joy and connection that he channels during his creative process, and that by returning to these familiar subjects, he is also returning to those profound memories of his youth. Slonem’s spirituality is imbued into each of his paintings, and in kind, these paintings reward the viewer in unexpected and deeply moving ways.

This explains why many collectors of Slonem’s paintings often come back for more after buying just one small bunny. Demand for his work remains strong after over 40 years of showing. Slonem’s paintings can be found in over 250 museums around the world, and he is represented in over 80 galleries globally. The unapologetic and infectious joy from these paintings is something we just can’t take our eyes off of. 

Please join us in celebrating the Grenning Gallery's 28th Year in Business!

This summer's events calendar is full of exciting events, including Opening Receptions, Studio Visits, Closing Parties, Art Fairs, and more.

Please note that our Opening Receptions will be held on THURSDAYS this Summer!

JUNE

 Hunt Slonem Solo Show

Opening Reception: Thursday, June 19th, 6:00pm-7:30pm@ Grenning Gallery, 26 Main St, Sag HarborThe exhibition is on view June 19th, 2025 - July 13th, 2025

JULY

Hampton's Fine Art Fair

July 10th - 13th, 12:00pm-6:00pm @ Southampton Fairgrounds, 605 County Road 39, Southampton, NYSpecial appearance by Hunt Slonem for a book signing, Friday, July 11th at 4:00pmTo secure your ticket, call us at the gallery 631-725-8469 or email info@grenninggallery.com

Closing Party: Hunt Slonem Solo Sow

Saturday, July 12th from 5:00pm-7:00pm@ Grenning Gallery, 26 Main St, Sag HarborDrinks, hor d'oeuvres, and live music to celebrate the end of Hunt Slonem's Solo Show

Darius Yektai Solo Show

Opening Reception: Thursday, July 17th, 6:00pm - 7:30pm@ Grenning Gallery, 26 Main St, Sag HarborThe exhibition is open July 17th, 2025 - August 3rd, 2025

AUGUST

Summer Group Show: Steven Levin, Anthony Mastromatteo, Doug Reina & introducing Gene Johnson

VIP COCKTAIL PARTY - Invite Only

Thursday, August 7th from 6:00pm-8:00pmSpecial VIP preview of our Summer Group Show, with artists Tony Mastromatteo, Doug Reina, Steven Levin, and new artist Gene Johnson. This event is private invitation only.

Opening Reception: Friday, August 8th, 6:00pm - 7:30pm

@ Grenning Gallery, 26 Main St, Sag HarborThe exhibition is open August 8th, 2025 - August 24th, 2025

Ben Fenske Solo Show

Opening Reception: Thursday, August 28th, 6:00pm - 7:30pm@ Grenning Gallery, 26 Main St, Sag HarborThe exhibition is open August 28th, 2025 - September 14th, 2025

The Grenning Gallery is pleased to unveil CARMODY | WHITE, an exhibition celebrating two classically trained painters who’ve redirected their skilled hands to soften, allowing them to dive into their curiosity about uncommon color associations found in nature, which now drive their compositions. This exhibit will hang from Saturday, May 24th, through Sunday, June 15th, 2025. Please join us for an Opening Reception on Saturday, May 24th from 5:30-7:00 pm, both artists will be present.

We are also pleased to see that after over 100 years of painting on Shelter Island, the White family will be honored with a museum show! The Shelter Island History Museum will be hosting Generations of Shelter Island Impressionists, an exhibition of paintings from our own Nelson H. White, his father Nelson C. White, and his grandfather Henry C. White. The exhibition opens Saturday, June 28th, and hangs through October 11th.  The museum is located at 16 South Ferry Road on Shelter Island, NY. 

Kelly Carmody (b. 1977, Massachusetts) continues to assert herself as ‘king of her canvas’ with her latest body of work. Rooted in realism, Carmody’s compositions start very traditional in subject and composition; however, she further transforms her skilled hand by painting a single subject in multiple mediums and palettes and then using her sketches reference; Carmody’s new process has unearthed a unique point of view that feels both contemporary and harkens back to the studio’s of Henri Matisse, or Pierre Bonnard. Carmody has created a world that is beautiful, pleasant, and abundant. A sundrenched porch is adorned with pillow-tufted benches and a table of neatly arranged flora in vases. Plates of peaches are ready to be served, and books are plentiful. 

Carmody’s paintings play with this tension between flatness and depth as she translates subject into sketch, sketch into painting, and painting into another painting. She often selects compositions with distant backgrounds, close foregrounds, and complex middle ground subject matter. The spaces are skillfully done, attributing a similar level of detail to each plane, yet remaining distinct with clear relationships. To achieve this level of cohesion in complexity speaks to Carmody’s restraint and skill for impressionism.

The women in Carmody’s paintings are pensive, often lost in thought, settled onto chairs near unfinished activities; an open book downfacing on her lap, arms crossed near a bowl of cut fruit, a butter knife left on an empty plate. Surrounded by a rich palette and soft light, the figures in these paintings have a relaxed, contented, contemplative ease that vibrates from the painting and into the space around them. 

The composition for Pink Reflection began with the plein-air pastel drawing above which Carmody created sitting on the bridge at Dering Harbor, Shelter Island. In the pastel, we see a colorful sky with clouds scattering just after sunset. The horizon is intersected by masts from an assortment of sailboats. In the foreground, water runs out from beneath the bridge she sits upon, flowing into the harbor, the current accentuated by a simplistic design of little V shapes. As a poet does, when they go to write a line….Carmody translated this plein air sketch onto a canvas, she made decisions to omit a lot of what she saw on site. She emphasized the stillness of the harbor, where the pink sky casts a bright reflection onto the water’s surface. The sailboats intersecting the horizon were entirely omitted, heightening a sensation of peaceful contemplation. The movement in the foreground is only annotated by her echoing the pattern of arrows pointing us toward the direction of the water’s current. What started as a plein air pastel, sparked by an interesting light effect, resulted in a studio painting that emanates light itself. 

Lifelong painter Nelson H. White (b. 1932, Connecticut) is widely appreciated for his loyalty to natural landscapes and intimate impressionism. His loose brushstrokes are skillfully applied, consistently capturing a quiet, relaxed atmosphere, whether that be on a beach in Italy or a view of the bay from Shelter Island. White communicates nature’s serenity through his spacious compositions and subtle details. 

White uses impasto and texture to communicate atmosphere, which is unique to his work. In Dering Harbor 07.30.2022, the movement in the sky made by a palette knife translates to windy, overcast weather, a detail which might be lost on the viewer had the sky been rendered with smooth, consistent brushstrokes. Changes in his approach to painting reflect reality, time, and environment, allowing him to return to the same subjects again and again, finding a new painting every time. This skill is reflective of White’s deep presence with nature and ability to translate sense into image, something that is well earned after painting en plein air for over 70 years!

White also exhibits skillful restraint in his paintings, his experience as a seasoned painter allows him to decide how much detail a painting needs in order to express the true feeling of a scene. In The Red Umbrellas, his brushstrokes are precise, the distant forms of walking figures are distinct, the shadows of beach chairs inform us exactly of the suns position. In this painting, the texture of the paint is smooth and even, allowing the precise details of his subject to shine. Adversely, in The Road, Shelter Island, N.Y. 06.05.2024  White takes the opposite approach, abandoning strict detail for thicker paint, letting texture speak first, the full composition singing to subject, scene, and impression. It is for this intelligent handling of his subjects and paint that Nelson H. White has been a cherished artist for the Grenning Gallery since it's inception in 1997. 

Nelson H. White has been painting professionally since the 1960s and studied with the world-famous Pietro Annigoni, after growing up in a family of painters.  His father, Nelson C. White (1900 – 1989), and his grandfather, Henry C. White (1861-1952), both painted and are considered part of the Connecticut Impressionist School.  His grandfather sailed over to Shelter Island in 1908 and bought a healthy tract of land on Menantic Creek and built a family “fishing homestead” on the water.  While the whole family visits and paints on the property like their forefathers, the community is grateful that the White family has recently gifted most of the open space to the Community Preservation Fund.