Artist Biography & Facts

Steve Hudson

Steve Hudson (b. 1966)

His paintings depict often grotesquely distorted nude figures in a chaotic situation, surrounded by refuse of our civilization, plastic bottles or kitchen appliances, highlighting the absurdity of the human condition.

My dramas offer a fantastic view of humanity existing after some unspecified cataclysm. Here, the apocalypse is a conceit dulled by reiteration. Revealed in an unforgiving light, the pulpy and flawed inhabitants convulse or grope about, naked, as if on display. Glances are averted, gestures are uneasy. Names and places are no more. Their time of judgment has long been forgotten. Littered about them are token remnants of our own materialism, its meaning stripped away and replaced with something cryptic.

Born in New Bedford, Massachusetts in 1966, he lives and works in Champaign, Illinois.

Education:
1984-88 Southeastern Massachusetts University, Dartmouth, MA, Magna cum Laude
1989-91 Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, IL, MFA Painting

Awards:
2003 Illinois Arts Council Fellowship
1994 Arts Midwest, National Endowment for the Arts
1992 Bristol-Myers Squibb Company Purchase Award
1990 Masters Fellowship, Southern Illinois University
1998 Fine Arts Achievement Award, Binney & Smith
1988 Highest Scholastic Standing, College of Visual and Performing Arts, Southeastern Massachusetts University
1984-88 Talent Tuition Waiver, Southeastern Massachusetts University

Selected Exhibitions:
2010  Tumult, one-person show, Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL
2009  The Francis and June Spiezer Collection, group show, Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL
23rd Biennial Southern Illinois Artists Open Competition & Exhibition, group show, Cedarhurst Center for the Arts, Mt. Vernon, IL, award
Steven Hudson/paintings and Bradley Ogan/ceramics, two-person show, Preston Jackson Gallery, Contemporary Art Center of Peoria, Peoria, IL
2008  Absent the Landscape of Journey, one-person show, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL
Landscapes, one-person show, Quincy Art Center, Quincy, IL
2007  Forty North, featured painter, multi-disciplinary exhibit, Champaign, IL
2006  All Terrain: Perspectives on Landscape, group show, Parkland Gallery, Champaign, IL
2005  The Modern Landscape, group show, Springfield Art Association, Springfield, IL
2004  Springer Cultural Center, group show, Champaign, IL
2003  Zounds, group show, Hyde Park Arts Center, Hyde Park, IL
Here and Now, group show, Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, IL
Spiezer Collection, group show, Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL, catalog
2002  The Perception of Appearance: A Decade of American Contemporary Figure Drawing, group show, Frye Art Museum, Seattle, WA, catalog
2001  Small Paintings, group show, Weber State University, Art Gallery, Ogden, UT
1999  Requiem: Living Artists Eulogize a Dying Century, curated by artist collective TABOO, Nexus Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta, GA
1998  New Paintings, one-person show, Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL
1997  Magical Realism, group show, Indiana University, Gallery Northwest, curated by Drs. Patricia Lundberg and Roberta Wollons
Figure 8, Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL, catalog
1996  Disjecta, one-person show, Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL
The Figurative Works of Tim Doud and Steven Hudson, College of Lake County, Grayslake, IL
1995  Contemporary Art Series #5: Steven Hudson, one-person show, Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, IL, catalog
Allegorical Landscape, group show, Suburban Fine Art Center, Highland Park, IL
1994  Paper, group show, Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL
1993  Paintings for the Millennium, one-person show, Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL
High Density Light: Five Painters' Use Theatrical Light as a Foundation for Their Visions, group show, Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL
Urgent Nostalgia, group show, Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle, WA
Drawing on the Figure, group show, Carlsten Art Gallery, University of Wisconsin Stevens Point, catalog
The Eidetic Image: Contemporary Works on Paper, group show, Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, catalog; traveling to: Newport Harbor Art Museum, Newport Beach, CA; Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, NY; University of Oklahoma Museum of Art, Norman; I Space Gallery, Chicago, IL
1992  Expulsion, one-person show, Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL
Realism Today, group show, Evansville Museum of Arts & Sciences, Evansville, IN, purchase award
1991  Thesis Show, Mitchell Gallery, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, IL

Sources include:
Parkland College online
shudsonart.com