Partner Theophilus Brown

Queer Places:
371 61st St, Oakland, CA 94618
57 E 57th St, New York, NY 10022

Paul John Wonner (April 24, 1920 – April 23, 2008) was an American artist best known for his still-life paintings done in an abstract expressionist style.[1][2] Born in Tucson, Arizona, he received a B.A. in 1952, an M.A. in 1953, and an M.L.S. in 1955―all from the University of California, Berkeley.[3] He rose to prominence in the 1950s as an abstract expressionist associated with the Bay Area Figurative Movement,[1] along with his partner, Theophilus Brown, whom he met in 1952 while attending graduate school. In 1956, Wonner started painting a series of dreamlike male bathers and boys with bouquets.

In the early 1960s, Brown and Wonner moved to Santa Monica, where they developed a close friendship with fellow gay couple, novelist Christopher Isherwood, and portrait artist Don Bachardy. Over the years, Brown and Wonner also fostered friendships with playwright William Inge, composer and conductor André Previn, actress Eva Marie Saint and her husband, director Jeffery Hayden, and New Zealand novelist Janet Frame.

In 1962, Wonner began teaching at the University of California, Los Angeles. By the end of the 1960s, he had abandoned his loose figurative style and focused exclusively on still lifes in a hyperrealist style. Wonner died April 23, 2008, in San Francisco, California.

Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA

University of California, Berkeley, CA

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