No matter how many images you see of the breathtakingly detailed, hand-drawn original art of CJ Hendry, you are still not getting the full effect of the incredible amount of work and precision it takes her to create each piece.

The selection of the iconic pieces to feature, and in the case of this latest Trophy Series, the dipping of the pieces in liquid bronze, then the lighting, the photography and, finally, the painstaking hours of pen-work can start.

This is why The Cool Hunter, as the exclusive representative of C.J. Hendry, has presented hugely successful solo shows of her work in the past two years in Sydney, Melbourne and Miami. The art is stunning in pictures but truly unbelievable in real life. Each show has sold out all of the exhibited pieces, most of them prior to the opening date.

This time, we are presenting her latest, the Trophy Series in her first show in Soho New York, her current city of residence. The show is open until November 20th, at 70 Greene street from 11 am to 7 pm.

Read more about the Trophy Series here.

Read all about CJ Hendry, her work and her earlier exhibitions here.

CJ Hendry – The Trophy Room
79 Greene St
Soho, New York
11am till 7pm
Until 20th Nov, 2016 

Interested buyers get in touch. (CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter)

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New York-based Australian artist, CJ Hendry is dipping again. After her famous work based on dipping a pair of Nike Air Mags in black paint, hand-drawing an image of it, and then auctioning the image to charity, CJ has now been playing with liquid bronze.
 

She’s now dipped iconic items – including a headless Barbie, Beats headphones and a Hermes Birkin bag – plus assorted other pleasing shapes, such as a Coca Cola bottle and a balloon, in liquid bronze.

Then she’s mounted the now-metallic items on concrete plinths, elevating the treasured objects to a trophy-like state. Then she’s photographed them.
 

And only after that she’s started the painstaking work of actually putting pen to paper. She has drawn each image meticulously by hand in black ink.

The reflective, metallic surfaces of the items allow CJ Hendry’s incredible unique talent of capturing light and shadow with only a black pen.
 

The images look like hyper-realistic, large, black-and-white photos but they are much more than that. Each piece is an individual, one-of-a-kind piece of art that has taken tens of hours to create.

The new Bronzed Trophy Series will be exhibited in New York the first week of November 2016. The location will be revealed for the first time on the opening day of the exhibition.

More information about CJ Hendry, her work and previous exhibitions can be found here:
 

You can watch her draw live 24/7 here:

CJ Hendry is represented exclusively by The Cool Hunter. Contact us at [email protected]

CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter)

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To take people on a completely new journey while doing what you have come to be admired for is a creative’s dream. The latest piece by New York-based artist CJ Hendry is an epic example of just that.

She’s bought a pair of Nike AirMags for $9,000, dipped them in black paint, photographed them and then hand-drawn a massive nine-foot black-and white piece of it. She’ll auction it off in Miami at Scope Art Fair and with 100% of the profits she and The Cool Hunter are purchasing shoes for children in New York.
Yes it’s still thousands of scribbles on a page, yes it’s a hand-drawn enlargement of a high-end fashion item, and yes it’s the same flawless attention to detail that we’d associate with CJ’s work. Yet within this piece there are many cool firsts we haven’t seen before.
For instance, CJ has never produced a piece that illustrates movement like this. As the paint drips off the shoes and pools at the bottom of the image, it evokes images of much greater issues. In many ways it mimics an oil spill tarnishing an irreplaceable commodity.

Also worth reflection was the outrage of some sneaker fanatics when rumors of CJ dipping the Nike AirMags in a bucket of black paint surfaced on social media.

Such a reaction is true to the time we live in, when sneaker culture and being a sneakerhead is no longer a hobby but a near-religion. To sneakerheads their collection of shoes is their holy book and each piece is like a part of scripture. When you consider CJ’s bold statement in this light, it was essentially the ultimate act of blasphemy. Sneakerheads, movie fanatics and fashionistas alike have dreamt for thirty years of owning these shoes, ever since 1985 when Michael J. Fox took us back to a future that we now live in.

Not everybody can own a pair of AirMags though, even if you did have a lazy $9,000 laying around. With only 1500 pairs ever made, finding your size and a seller is a near-impossible task. This makes destroying them seem even more like the ultimate act of insanity.

But as controversial as this piece may be, there is an equal amount of generosity attached to it. CJ and The Cool Hunter will be donating 100% of the profits to charity in the form of sneakers to those less fortunate than ourselves. Instantly, this work goes from being far more than just an outrageous conversation piece.

Instead, it inspires discussion on important and socially challenging questions and at the time, attempts to do something that helps. Would you have dipped the shoes in paint? How much do material items really mean to you? At what price would you destroy something so rare and cherished? And most importantly, would you destroy that item if it meant you could be helping many people far less fortunate than yourself?

In essence CJ has taken an expensive, highly valued and sought-after item, devalued it and then transformed it into a valuable commodity – much-needed footwear – to help those who are less fortunate.

There’s no affiliation with Nike, the shoes are very real and the possibilities as to how many people can be helped rely squarely on how much someone is willing to pay for this career-defining piece when it goes up for auction at her upcoming Miami show.
They say you can’t understand a person’s journey until you’ve walked a thousand miles in their shoes. This transformation of Nike AirMags is an attempt to help in that understanding.

CJ Hendry’s show in Miami was extremely successful with the Half-dipped Nike Air Mags selling for US$130,000. She is now busy turning the funds into thousands of pairs of sneakers for needy kids in New York.

The rest of the show was a huge success as well with CJ drawing her distinctive art in a transparent booth. This drew enormous crowds as most people thought the pieces were black-and-white photographs, not hand-drawn one-of-a kind works.

Several private commissions were ordered with more orders coming in after the show.

Countless celebrities came by, including Alicia Keys’s husband Swizz Beats who shared some of CJ’s work on Instagram @therealswizz.

CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter

The post Half Dipped Nike Air Mags Drawn by CJ Hendry appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.

We are excited to announce that CJ Hendry is working on another super-cool, exclusive series of hand-drawn images: The Alphabet!
Never one to take the easy way out, she has chosen to draw shiny, metallic helium balloons.

Drawing anything with just a pen is tough enough – impossible formost of us – but to draw massive photographic images of reflective 3D objects is incredible!
But in her typical low-key fashion, CJ Hendry says she decided to create the alphabet series from a set of shiny balloons because she ‘;just likes the mirror effect and the reflection of the balloons, but mostly because it’s just fun!’;

Only one image of each letter will be available plus two special characters: $ (dollar sign) and & (ampersand).
She has just started drawing the images and half of them are already sold! If you are interested, contact us;
Framed size: 90cm x 90cm. CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter

The post New CJ Hendry Artworks – Helium Balloon Series appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.

Phenomenal. Mind-boggling. Exhilarating. Exhausting. The success of CJ Hendry’s art is all of these. The Cool Hunter’s most recent CJ Hendry event, the 2.5-week Melbourne 50-plates and food art experience out did all of our previous successes with her meticulously hand-drawn, one-of-a-kind drawings.

Every single one of the 50 drawings was sold BEFORE the show even opened. More than 10,000 people attended the happening that received massive media coverage as well. Here, here, here & here
But the unstoppable CJ Hendry is already making here next move. A move to New York, no less. The Cool Hunter will be there with her to create a special event unlike any we’ve created before. To celebrate her American debut, she’s drawn an American flag.

You are seeing it now, If you want it, react immediately and contact us with your bid. This is an auction, open from now till Monday, April 20, 2015, 11 pm New York time.
120x170cm framed
Includes delivery globally
[email protected]

CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter

The post Hand Drawn American Flag By CJ Hendry appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.

The work of an extraordinary artistic talent such as CJ Hendry deserves and demands more than plain white walls for its showcase.

That was the approach The Cool Hunter took right from the beginning with her meticulous hand-drawn art work.

TCH first introduced her in Sydney, Australia, as part of the Art Hunter experience in conjunction with Jaguar.

This was followed by her first solo presentation, a four-day exclusive art and food reception at a private luxury residence in Sydney.

Following that successful sell out debut, TCH has just launched CJ Hendry’s 50 Foods in 50 Days Gourmet Experience in Melbourne.

Every one of CJ Hendry’s pieces has been sold out prior to the three events, and such was the case with 50 Foods in 50 Days as well. Each of the 50 square black-and-white hand-drawn pieces, depicting photo-realistic French designer plates with various food items, was sold as soon as the series was announced. The hunger for her art seems to be insatiable!

The CJ Hendry Gourmet Art Experience takes place from March 27 to April 12 at 166 Gertrude Street in Fitzroy, Melbourne’s most interesting neighbourhood. The space used to be a paint store until Kalex Boutique Property Development transformed it into an event space.

To create an arresting milieu for the art and the food, The Cool Hunter briefed its go-to event designer extraordinaire, Sydney-based Natalie Longheon, to create a minimal monochrome gourmet food store stocked with the best packaged food products from Australia and around the world.

As usual, Natalie more than delivered. Dramatic black envelopes the viewer and draws all attention to the mesmerizing art and intriguing gourmet food. The dramatic launch event build and production was by Moth Design.

Catering for our opening was by Melbourne’s best caterer, Georgina Damm from Damm Fine Food. Black cones filled with Parmesan and horseradish gelato topped with caviar and flowers.

Adding to the dark-theme, make-up artist Kate Radford applied smoky eyes for all the waiters. Water for the event was by San Pellegrino, beer by Sample and wine by Handpickedwines.

Coffee is provided by Melbourne’s coffee tasting specialists at Sensory Lab who created a pop up coffee store for the duration of the CJ Hendry experience.

The event branding and graphic design was created by Paper Stone Scissors and the paper for the Art Catalogue was provided by Spicers Australia.

Photography by Peter Tarasiuk.

CJ Hendry Gourmet Art Experience

166 Gertrude St
Fitzroy

27 March – 12 April
Monday’s – Closed
Tue to Friday – 12pm – 8pm
Sat/Sun – 10am – 4pm

Closed Good Friday and Easter Sunday – open Easter Saturday

CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter)

The post TCH launches CJ Hendry’s 50 Foods in 50 Days Exhibition in Melbourne appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.

Solitary confinement, food, high end design, prisoners on death-row, final meals, twenty-four hours, and fifty days. It sounds like the subplot for a quirky action film yet instead it’s actually an artistic collision of the senses, represented through beautiful one-of-a-kind hand drawn art.

The post CJ’s Hendry’s 50 Foods in 50 Days Series On Hermes Plates appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.

Pen of Paper artist CJ Hendry Debut solo show in Sydney.

CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter

The post CJ Hendry Solo Show – Sydney appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.

We first discovered CJ Hendry hyper-realistic drawings at the end of last year and were stunned immediately.

In early April this year we launched the Art Hunter in Sydney in conjunction with Jaguar and introduced CJ Hendry’s work as one of the featured elements of the occasion. Her reputation took off like a rocket and her work is selling out at record time.

For those who have just discovered The Cool Hunter or CJ Hendry, here’s some of the background story.

Her rise is extraordinary in the art world as it has all happened in just six short months. It is a testament to her talent and once again, a testament also to what we call ‘The Cool Hunter Effect.’ We hear about it all the time. How careers have taken off, reputations have been established, sales taken off because we have featured their work on The Cool Hunter.

We are happy to be the catalyst and supporter of excellent work, but CJ Hendry is unusual even among the ones we’ve supported before. So much so, that we became her exclusive agents/gallery.

And we HAVE supported her from the start because we saw the striking talent and the strong appeal of her old-school hand-drawn artistry in today’s technology-heavy world.

A few days prior to opening the Art Hunter, we posted an image of one of CJ Hendry’s works on Instagram to introduce her as one of the many artists we’ve been showcasing.

Within a few hours, we had received more than 50 enquiries from international buyers wanting to buy the piece we just posted. We did the same thing the following day and posted a different image and continued that a few days in a row. The result: All of her works were sold BEFORE we even opened The Art Hunter!

And this is how 90% of CJ’s work have been selling ever since. We recently introduced her playing card series, also on Instagram, and sold out the entire set within five days. All 54 cards, including two Jokers

Her $50K Fashion IT Bag series sold out. Her Boxing gloves were sold to a buyer in Saudia Arabia, the Nike ball went to London, the basketball to an employer at Apple in San Francisco. Even Kanye West now has one of CJ’s pieces.

Her mailing list now exceeds 1000, all serious potential buyers wanting to know what’s next.

So, to market her work further, we have wanted to take a new route, to continue to do things differently. To put an extraordinary talent into the boring same-old, white-walled art-gallery setting somehow just did not make sense to us. Her work deserved to be the talk of the town, an event, a happening, a celebration.

We decided to showcase her work in a private home in Sydney – a perfect match to her talent. After a long period of scouting, we found the incredible house that fits the style of CJ Hendry’s work impeccably.

It is a two-storey warehouse in Surry Hills converted to what is possibly Sydney’s coolest house. Home to a young savvy entrepreneur who likes to entertain, the house features its own private nightclub complete with gold bar, see-through glass smoking room, four bedrooms/bathrooms, a pool that looks into the nightclub and a super impressive sound system.

Plus a sleeping pod shaped like a UFO – the owner’s bedroom. The house alone offers limitless talking points, yet it served perfectly as the background for CJ’s pieces. They literally belong there. Neither overpowers the other, both the art and the house get to shine, they are flawlessly aligned.

Opening night was a huge success with over 500 people turning up to an art event they hadn’t experienced before – all being driven to and from the space courtesy of Uber.

The CJ Hendry art show residence was open only for four days to the public (4 Dec – 7 Dec). All the works sold out, 95% were sold before we even opened the doors and only 3 were available on opening night which were snapped up fast.

The gold bar in the private nightclub with flowers by Melbourne based florist FLEURS who we flew up for the event to create flower installations within the space. The gold flowers on the bar were sprayed 24 carat gold.

Pool balls, gold sofa and gold flowers.

Cj’s sports artworks

The entrance to the private nightclub was a perfect setting to display Cj’s playing card and pool ball series.

The bathroom in the private nightclub.

We had 2 large grazing tables that our talented event guru Natalie Longheon from Just Add Cream had created. Natalie also did the event design and production and we have used her previously for the Art Hunter & Summer Lovers Store.

The food was the talk of the night, super quality provided by the Louis Vuitton of butchers – Victor Churchill in Woollahra and incredible cheeses by Salt Meat Cheese in Alexandria. Mud Australia provided the plate ware

Guests admiring the detail in CJ Hendry’s work

The house was designed by Peter Ireland and interiors by Kelly Ross of The Gentry.

Admirers taking selfies in front of CJ’s work.

A huge thanks to our sponsors: Penfolds wine, Ciroc Vodka, San Pellegrino, Peroni, Rekorderlig Cider.

Up close and personal

“Can you believe this is an actual drawing’ was the most frequently overheard comment of the night.

– In March 2015, we’ll be showcasing CJ’s new works in Melbourne in yet another exceptional, un-gallery space.

– And Summer 2015, we’ll show more of CJ’s works in New York City and Art Basel Miami.

– CJ is exclusively represented by TCH. To be updated on CJ’s upcoming works and to get on her mailing list, send an email to – [email protected]

Photos by David Wheeler and Damien Milan.

CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter

The post The Cool Hunter Launches CJ Hendry Debut Solo Exhibition in Sydney appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.

Those of you who are regular TCH readers know of CJ Hendry already. She is the extraordinary pen-and-ink artist whose work we fell in love with and then introduced to the public, first through Instagram and then at our Art Hunter temporary art experience in Sydney that we hosted with Jaguar.

The success of her work has been absolutely phenomenal, and for a good reason. Nothing compares to the mesmerising result of her painstaking work. Each image appears to be an enlargement of a black-and-white photograph, except that it isn’t. It is a one-of-a-kind, hand-drawn piece of art.

Since the first images of her meticulous work were published on Instagram, CJ Hendry has been exclusively represented by thecoolhunter.

She started her series of images of playing cards, one image per crumpled card, and we posted one of the cards on Instagram a week ago. Since then, more than 40 cards have been sold.

We are in the planning stages of introducing the cards – and other CJ Hendry exclusive artworks – at a live space in Sydney or Melbourne next month, but we cannot reveal the details just yet. Keep an eye on The Cool Hunter for final specifics.

We are also planning a show of her work in New York for summer 2015.

Each card is 60cm x 60cm framed – To pre order before the show email [email protected]

****UPDATE – All 54 cards have now been sold via our Instagram in 5 days*****

CJ Hendry is exclusively represented by thecoolhunter

The post Cj Hendry – New Playing Card Series appeared first on The Cool Hunter Journal.