Visions from a White Mountain Palette, The Life and Times of Charles A. Hunt, Madison's White Mountain Painter

by Roy Bubb

Who was Charles A. Hunt? That’s the question Roy Bubb was often asked by visitors who viewed Hunt’s White Mountain paintings in the Madison (New Hampshire) Historical Society’s museum.

As a museum docent, Bubb began to research the obscure artist, uncovering his life in Nashua, New Hampshire, and his ties to Madison families. In his search the author learned about many more paintings, found a number of old photographs related to the artist and his family, and, as much as possible, answered the question about Hunt.

In preparing this book, Roy Bubb researched many Madison homesteads depicted in the Hunt paintings, and here reveals much town history concerning early settlers and their ties to each other as they struggled to farm the rocky hillsides.

A native of Madison, Charles A. Hunt (1852-1930) painted what he knew, the farms of his hometown and, in the manner of other White Mountain artists, views of Mt. Chocorua, the Saco River Valley, and Mt. Washington.

Adding to Bubb’s work are the critiques of art historian Charlotte Colby Andersen, who describes Hunt’s “wonderful sense of color” and “his excellent feel for composition.” All of this skill shows “a painterly ability in a supposedly untaught painter.”

Bubb was able to locate twenty paintings, some privately owned, others in several museums. Perhaps more will be identified as a result of this publication and Charles A. Hunt will once again be known for his artistic talents, as he was when he died in Nashua where he had lived for sixty years and was described in his obituary as “a landscape artist of considerable note.”

“This historical treasure duly recognizes Charles A. Hunt as an outstanding artist; an admirable tribute to a humble and gifted painter who captured the White Mountains on canvas for his friends and family from the 1870s–1920s.”

—Nancy Harmon Martin, Madison Historical Society
 Madison, New Hampshire

About the Author

Roy Bubb was born in Orleans County in western New York State of a farm family. Educated in the New York State University system, he taught in Niagara Falls, NY, later spending twenty-five years as an assistant professor at the College at Brockport, State University of New York.
Upon retiring to Silver Lake, New Hampshire, he became interested in the artistic works of Charles A. Hunt, an unknown White Mountain painter, who spent many years in the area between 1852 and 1930. The author, in his research, had to rely on numerous distant cousins for information on this reclusive artist.

Prior to this book, Roy Bubb wrote his memoirs, Memories of Manning Corners, which was published by a New York Historical Society.

Ordering Information

Copies are available from:

Madison Historical Society
P.O. Box 505
Madison NH 03849

www.madisonhistorical.us

All proceeds go to the Madison Historical Society Building Restoration Fund.

7x10 hardcover, 102 pages, with 21 full-color images of Hunt's paintings, ISBN10: 1-931807-73-6, ISBN13: 978-1-931807-73-9, $40.00.