STARR HARDRIDGE (Muscogee/Creek)
Born in 1974 in Dennison, Texas; lives in Knoxville, Tennessee
Starr Hardridge rides the fences between the Native and Western Contemporary art worlds. His approach to painting is one of his own with a style sewn in to the fabric of his Mvskoke ancestry. He uses Pointillist dots of color to convey a beaded surface over the canvas. Ignoring traditional paint application he weaves together a contemporary narrative of the American west through a Native lens. His portrayals of Indigenous peoples and Native cowboys are not a distant memory but a reflection of modern peoples who continue family tradition.
STARR HARDRIDGE WAS BORN IN DENNISON, TEXAS in 1974 and was raised throughout central Oklahoma. Hardridge is of Muscogee Creek and European ancestry. He is an enrolled member of the Muscogee Creek nation of Oklahoma and is a Tuskegee tribal town descendant. He attended Savannah College of Art and Design from 1993-1997 and earned a B.F.A in Illustration. In 1998 he co-founded Architecture Studios, a Connecticut-based decorative painting and design firm. Hardridge furthered his studies in painting and design by attending the Nadai/Verdon Atelier of Decorative Painting in Penne de Agenais France 2005-2006. His decorative experience includes residential, commercial, institutional, government buildings, and houses of worship. In 2010 he shifted away from the decorative world and leaned into his own family history. Indigenous Art and Western heritage became his primary subject matter. Hardridge’s work can be found in collections such as the Oklahoma State Capitol Building, The National Museum of Wildlife Art, The National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum, the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art, The Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Philbrook Museum of Art.
Gallery Representation
Manitou Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Exhibit C Gallery, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
In 2006, Terry Cooke Hall focused exclusively on developing a fine art career with strong roots in California Impressionism, eventually transitioning into a professional artist career in 2009. Since 2014, she has earned numerous awards while exhibiting in more than 40 nationally-known museum art exhibitions along with several gallery group shows. Terry’s stylized inspirations have been featured in several national magazines, most recently in the Jan-Feb 2022 Art of the West as well as a cover article in Southwest Art magazine in 2019. Her work has been purchased by both corporate and private collectors across the nation. Now residing in Bozeman, Montana, her contemporary style is a result of exploring the colors and essence of the American West, viewed through the lens of more than 30 years of work in design and illustration.