Joe Shannon
Born in Lares, Puerto Rico, in 1933, Joe Shannon has been a resident of the Washington, D.C., area since childhood. He has shown in galleries and museums locally and nationally and his work is represented in major museums and numerous private collections.
For many years he was an exhibition designer and curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and Hirshhorn Museum. He also taught painting at the Maryland Institute College of Art and wrote art criticism for several national magazines. Shannon’s love of nature is evident. As a dedicated realist, he captures the inspiration of the great outdoors as well as his lifelong passion for hunting and fishing. He explains, Satch is Ready captures the moment his hunting dog is ready to retrieve a duck in the Potomac River; The Buck is an example of a landscape that reveals the beauty of the woods as a camouflage for a deer hunter; and Diana at Catoctin Creek portrays a mythical goddess in nature.
Shannon says, “My work is wideranging—all over the place—from figure painting to landscapes to portraits. I’ve been an outdoorsman all my life, loving nature. The Potomac River to this day is a prime source of inspiration for my landscapes. Another fundamental theme for me is the nude—classic and stylized. I frequently add them in my landscapes to reflect my interest in mythology such as the story Diana and Actaeon.”
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(301) 651-8597 www.joeshannonart.com