Full Text of HR0815 97th General Assembly
HR0815 97TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY |
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| 1 | | HOUSE RESOLUTION
| 2 | | WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois House of | 3 | | Representatives are pleased to congratulate Richard Howard | 4 | | Hunt for his many achievements as a sculptor; and
| 5 | | WHEREAS, Richard Hunt was born on September 12, 1935, in | 6 | | Chicago; he attended Chicago Public Schools before attending | 7 | | the University of Illinois in Chicago; in 1953, he attended the | 8 | | University of Chicago; in 1957, he earned his bachelor's degree | 9 | | in art education from the School of the Art Institute of | 10 | | Chicago; from 1957 to 1958, he traveled and studied in England, | 11 | | France, Spain, and Italy under the Art Institute of Chicago's | 12 | | James Nelson Raymond Foreign Travel Fellowship; and
| 13 | | WHEREAS, Richard Hunt served his country as a member of the | 14 | | United States Army from 1958 to 1960; and
| 15 | | WHEREAS, Richard Hunt is well known throughout the world | 16 | | for his abstract sculpture; he began sculpting in his teens, | 17 | | modeling in clay and carving in his bedroom at home; he later | 18 | | created a studio in the basement of his father's barbershop; as | 19 | | a teen, he was intrigued by metalwork at the African collection | 20 | | of Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History, where his mother, | 21 | | a librarian, frequently took him; his work in a zoological lab | 22 | | at the University of Chicago during high school and college |
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| 1 | | contributed to his fascination with animal and insect forms; | 2 | | and
| 3 | | WHEREAS, From 1953 to 1957, Richard Hunt attended the Art | 4 | | Institute of Chicago, where he focused on sculpture, especially | 5 | | welding, and studied lithography; while at the Institute, he | 6 | | was exposed to the work of the sculptors Julio Gonzales and | 7 | | David Smith, to whom he has attributed inspiration to use | 8 | | direct-metal techniques to transform steel, aluminum, copper, | 9 | | and bronze into sculpture; using a welding torch as his mallet | 10 | | and chisel, he transformed found objects, scrap metal, and auto | 11 | | parts found on industrial sites into plant-like and insect-like | 12 | | forms; in 1959, he won his first award at an annual show for | 13 | | artists at the Chicago Art Institute; and
| 14 | | WHEREAS, By 1960, Richard Hunt had become a major | 15 | | open-form, direct-metal sculptor in the art world; at this | 16 | | time, he began to combine closed with open forms, calling them | 17 | | "hybrid figures"; in the 1970s, he added inventive Baroque | 18 | | flourishes to his forms so that solids seemed both to penetrate | 19 | | voids and to be penetrated by them; he later began to gradually | 20 | | move away from his early calligraphic work, instead turning to | 21 | | closed contours and solid shapes; and
| 22 | | WHEREAS, Richard Hunt has produced more than 130 public | 23 | | site specific sculptures, including a cross and candelabra for |
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| 1 | | St. Matthew's Methodist Church in Chicago in 1970, Fight Forms | 2 | | for Midway Airport, and freeform for the State of Illinois | 3 | | Office Building (now James R. Thompson Center) in Chicago; he | 4 | | has created many other sculptures, color lithographs, and | 5 | | drawings, including memorials to Martin Luther King, Jr. and | 6 | | the Freedmens Bureau; he has also recently been chosen to | 7 | | create a commemorative for Ida B. Wells in Bronzeville in | 8 | | Chicago; and | 9 | | WHEREAS, In 1971, Richard Hunt became the first | 10 | | African-American sculptor to be accorded a retrospective at the | 11 | | Museum of Modern Art in New York; throughout the years, he has | 12 | | received Guggenheim, Ford, and Tamarind Fellowships, and | 13 | | awards from the Art Institute of Chicago, including the Logan, | 14 | | Palmer, and Compana prizes; he holds numerous honorary degrees | 15 | | from prestigious universities and has been elected to | 16 | | membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the | 17 | | National Academy of Design; he has also served on the National | 18 | | Council of the Arts, as a commissioner of the Smithsonian | 19 | | Institution's National Museum of American Art, and as a juror | 20 | | for Maya Lin's Vietnam Veteran's Memorial in Washington, D.C.; | 21 | | and
| 22 | | WHEREAS, In 2008, Richard Hunt became the inspiration for | 23 | | the "Richard Hunt Fine Arts Room" within the newly-built campus | 24 | | of Christ the King Jesuit College Preparatory High School in |
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| 1 | | order to give young people the opportunity to pursue the fine | 2 | | arts and motivate them through his extraordinary example of | 3 | | creativity and his artistic vision; and | 4 | | WHEREAS, Richard Hunt serves as a model of hard work, | 5 | | integrity, and dedication for the people of the State of | 6 | | Illinois; therefore, be it
| 7 | | RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE | 8 | | NINETY-SEVENTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that | 9 | | we congratulate Richard Howard Hunt for his many achievements | 10 | | as an artist and thank him for serving as an exemplar in the | 11 | | African-American community and as a source of inspiration | 12 | | during Black History Month; and be it further
| 13 | | RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be | 14 | | presented to Richard Hunt as a symbol of our esteem and | 15 | | respect.
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