Nicholas Hunt featuring "Caliber Abstraction"

CALIBER ABSTRACTIONS will feature all new original works from Nicholas Hunt.
Born February 4th, 1985 in Newport Beach, California. Nicholas Hunt grew up surrounded by business minded entrepreneurs and Southern California art icons Billy Al Bengston, Peter Alexander, Chuck Arnoldi, Laddie John Dill, Andy Moses, Joe Goode, and Ed Ruscha. These experiences in business, art, California culture, and the unmistakable beauty and variety of Southern California landscapes have been instrumental in developing his visual acuity.
Nicholas received a BA in Art History from Pepperdine University, and an MA in Art Business from Sotheby’s Art Institute in New York to begin a career as an art dealer. After several years working on the business side of art, Hunt went dark in 2015 to begin creating art full-time. Upon his reemergence, Hunt has unveiled a series of breakthrough works around a central theme of “Value” — an often times “Taboo” subject in the art world that Hunt regularly confronted in the world of art business and more importantly in everyday life. By rushing head-on into what he knows to be a support pillar for society and artistic creation, Hunt uses his art as a vessel to draw attention to our almost pornographic avoidance of conversations around “value” and “money" in relation to art.
In Nicholas Hunt’s Caliber Abstraction series he has invented a method to add value by subtraction, and through the process created a contemporary reincarnation reminiscent of Robert Rauschenberg's 'Erased de Kooning'.
On a conceptual and humanistic level, his Caliber Abstraction series is also a symbol for the value that life creates within the individual self. Throughout life we are challenged, rewarded, broken, repaired, and scarred physically and sometimes emotionally. It’s these experiences to which we owe our individuality, our uniqueness, and in essence our value. Similar to Hunt’s artwork, our true colors are revealed and polished through our collision course with life.
“Visually I have always been stimulated by change, color, light and space. So what I wanted to do was find a new way to add value and “create" color through a completely negative process. The idea of the gun represents both the logical and final conclusion of an eraser while epitomizing the ultimate Western, or American, tool.” -NEH
Each unique piece has been laser cut, polished,
anodized, and painted with ten or more layers of oil based enamel before being shot with different guns and a multitude of bullets based on desired visual effect.
“Even though the process of creation is quite destructive, the outcome results in the creation of something strong, beautiful, uplifting and positive." -NEH

MUGELLO GALLERY represents emerging and mid-career artists. A newer arrival to Los Angeles art scene – they launched in 2014 with a digital first strategy. Leveraging social media and the internet to quickly grow and bring awareness to their artists. After spending the past three years exhibiting at international fairs, and selling work from their artist’ studios, they decided now was the time to stake their claim on a brand new space here in downtown LA’s burgeoning art scene.
The new LA space will serve as the first of what will be a national expansion for Mugello. “We believe strongly in our artists, our tastes, and the growing interest our generation is showing towards art and creativity. We’ve been very thoughtful in our model – our site selection and low overhead allows us to reinvest heavily in our artists studios so they can continue producing new and exciting work.”
“Los Angeles is amazing, the energy, the creativity, and the open spaces provide local artists with key ingredients that are starting to disappear in so many of our cities today. There was a lot of talk about the Los Angeles art scene overtaking city XYZ back in the 90’s but it seems the momentum is here and these prophecies are finally coming true... waiting patiently for the next generation of taste makers perhaps.”
– Founder James Wright
NICHOLAS HUNT
www.nehstudio.com
MUGELLO GALLERY
www.mugelloart.com