Attributed to Clementine Hunter, no coa, private collection, medium: oil measurements: 25"HX29"W framed, good condition,some knicks and scratches Biography: Clementine Hunter was a self-taught Black folk artist from the Cane River region of Louisiana, who lived and worked on Melrose Plantation. Hunter was born into a Louisiana Creole family at Hidden Hill Plantation near Cloutierville, in Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana. Hunter has become one of the most well-known self-taught artists. Hunter is described as a memory painter because she documented Black Southern life in the Cane River Valley in the early 20th century. She was entirely self-taught and received almost no formal education, art or otherwise.Although she was first recognized for her painting skills in 1939, Hunter speaks about painting long before then. Her most famous work depicts brightly colored depictions of important events like funerals, baptisms, and weddings and scenes of plantation labor like picking cotton or pecans, and domestic labor. However, Hunter's paintings vary in subject and style, including many abstract paintings and still life paintings of zinnias.Hunter painted from memory, stating: "I just get it in my mind and I just go ahead and paint but I can't look at nothing and paint. No trees, no nothing. I just make my own tree in my mind, that's the way I paint."Cammie Henry created an artists' colony after the death of her husband at Melrose Plantation. Numerous artists and writers visited, including Lyle Saxon, Roark Bradford, Alexander Woollcott, Rose Franken, Gwen Bristow, and Richard Avedon.[8] Frequently, the paint and brushes left by New Orleans artist Alberta Kinsey are cited as the first materials Hunter used to paint with on a window shade. However, it's clear from Hunter's textile work that she was producing narrative and expressionist work before painting.Additionally, Hunter's own accounts of her early career contradict the story of Kinsey's influence, Hunter has spoken about painting earlier than 1939.Picking Cotton (c.1955), Minneapolis Institute of ArtHunter began selling paintings after the death of her husband, Emmanuel Hunter.On the outside of the cabin where she lived was a sign that read: "Clementine Hunter, Artist. 25 cents to Look."Clementine Hunter's first shows were in 1945 in Rosenwald Grant, Brownwood, and Waco Texas. In 1949, a show of Hunter's paintings at the New Orleans Arts and Crafts Show garnered attention outside of the Cane River Valley. An article was published about Hunter in Look magazine in June 1953, giving her national exposure.