The Persistence of Memory Painting

Tony Chimento is a realist painter who built his career in Miami over the last 20 years after arriving from the Northeast. Born and raised in New Jersey, he graduated from Rutgers University. After graduating, he moved to Woodstock, NY and began his career as an artist.  For many years he was a resident artist of Art Center/ South Florida. He serves on the board of directors there.  His work comprises extremely detailed and complex interior and still life scenes of amazing detail, clarity and color. Mr. Chimento has shown in numerous one man shows, and 
been chosen for many regional and national juried shows and competitions.  (Mr. Chimento was the recipient of the 2008 POLLOCK-KRASNER AWARD. This $25,000.00 prize is for artistic merit over the course of his career.)  He has been chosen twice as a winner in the “New American Paintings” competition for the Southern Region. The Winsor & Newton Company chose his work as the winning entry in their 3rd Annual Competition. He has been written  about in articles in various publications including American Artist Magazine and the New York Times. Other awards include The New York Graphic Society Award at the National Academy of Design Show in NYC, and the Grand Prize for painting in the prestigious Silvermine Guild Center for the Arts Competition. He has been chosen for awards by jurors like Ted Stebbins, Curator of Paintings, Boston Museum, Vivian Raynor, Art Critic, New York Times, and John I.H. Baur, Director Emeritus, Whitney Museum of Art, NYC.  Critic Hilton Kramer, in reviewing a show for the New York Times, containing Mr. Chimento’s work commented in a review,  “...still there are paintings of some interest here by artists who were new to this writer.... Tony Chimento’s “Sunday Afternoon” is a solid realist work” In one of the first reviews of his work, Sylvia Day writes in Lifestye Magazine:  “My first introduction to Chimento’s work was at a show at the Woodstock Artist’s Association. There.... was a large painting which made an immediate impression of elegance and uncommon technique... Chimento paints large canvases, their dramatic subjectmatter and impeccable draughtsmanship a feast for the eye... He owns an original and unmistakably unique style."