Independent Arts News Reporting Peter Paone: Not So Still Life at Michener Art Museum features never-before exhibited paintings by the celebrated Philadelphia artist and educator
Reported on Monday, October 27, 2025.
Pictured Above: Paone. Photo Credit Kate Leigh Photography for the Michener Art Museum.
NEWSROOM POST: DOYLESTOWN, PENNSYLVANIA
A series of nearly forty recent paintings from Peter Paone place seemingly-disparate objects and animals in still life arrangements inspired by “a journey of a life lived”
Doylestown, PA – A new series of still lifes from Peter Paone, an artistic force of the Philadelphia region for over seven decades, is on view from October 11, 2025–March 15, 2026, at the Michener Art Museum exhibition Peter Paone: Not So Still Life.
Curated by Gerry and Marguerite Lenfest Chief Curator Laura Turner Igoe, the exhibition presents nearly forty recent paintings by the artist along with examples of Paone’s drawings that helped to generate his finished still lifes.
The works are inspired by Dutch vanitas paintings, in which the viewer is meant to contemplate the passage of time and inevitability of death. Paone combines seemingly-disparate objects and animals—like cakes, cats, asparagus, skeletons, birds, and fish—into intriguing arrangements.
“Historically, a still life painting has included subjects of domestic arrangements found within the artist’s reach. For me, a still life painting is much more than a composition of household goods. It’s a gathering from a journey of a life lived,” Paone said.
Providing a sense that someone has just left or arrived, the paintings in Peter Paone: Not So Still Life defy expectations of the still life genre with the surreal quality of his unexpected subjects. The artworks prompt more questions than answers in a narrative that viewers piece together from what Paone calls “objects draped in color performing together on a tabletop stage in a framed theater.”
“These tantalizing still lifes from Peter Paone delight the eye with bright colors, fantastical creatures, and imaginative cakes and table settings,” Igoe said. “They also encourage us to engage with the world around us, ask questions, and think about new possibilities.”
Paone’s work is drawn from his vivid imagination, an artistic approach where he famously does not work from models or draw directly from life. Even his extensive portfolio of sketches is not copied directly in a finished piece. Instead, they serve to inform his still life paintings, along with a number of intriguing objects collected throughout his 89 years of life and travels.
The final collection of never-before exhibited paintings in Peter Paone: Not So Still Life is full of contradiction and unresolved tension, reflecting the artist’s own history and worries about American society today. Some inanimate objects, like masks and pumpkins, repel with anthropomorphic—or even sinister—qualities. In other paintings, jarring compositions of cats and decadent cakes invite the viewer in with theatrical energy.
Pictured Above: Michener Paone. Photo Credit: Kate Leigh Photography for the Michener Art Museum.
The symbolic storytelling of each still life continues in the ornate frame designs that Paone made or adapted from a library of over 200 antiques. His expertise in cutting, carving, and gilding frames comes from a job at age 13 with Papale Brothers’ frame shop in South Philadelphia.
A free family activity guide for Peter Paone: Not So Still Life is available at the Visitor’s Services desk, with prizes for every completed submission. The exhibition is accompanied by a 92-page full-color catalogue on sale at the Museum Shop that includes short writings by Paone and his mentee, the artist Anastasia Alexandrin, an essay by Igoe, and a foreword by Executive Director Anne Corso.
“Michener Art Museum is honored to work with Paone on this exhibition and to bring it to the Bucks County community and beyond,” Corso said. “What I hope visitors see is the magic and mystery in Paone’s carefully constructed paintings, but also in the world around us—for none of us truly lives a still life.”
Major support for Peter Paone: Not So Still Life in the Beans Gallery is provided by Barbara Donnelly Bentivoglio, with additional support from John and Terri Paone.
Related Exhibition Programming for Peter Paone: Not So Still Life, on view October 11, 2025– March 15, 2026:
Members’ Only Opening Reception
Friday, October 10 / 5–7 p.m.
Free for Members / Preregistration required
Peter Paone: Not So Still Life Exhibition Opening Day
Saturday, October 11 / 10 a.m.–5 p.m.
Free for Members / General admission applies
Artful Arrangements Floral Workshop
Thursday, October 30 / 5:30–7:30 p.m.
$75 Member / $85 Non-Member
Make & Mingle: Cake Block Printing on Tea Towels
Thursday, November 6 / 6–8 p.m.
$50 Member / $60 Non-Member
Curator Conversation with Peter Paone
Wednesday, November 12 / 1–2 p.m.
$10 Member / $20 Non-Member
Mixed Media Collage Cakes Inspired by Peter Paone: Not So Still Life
Sunday, November 23 / 1–3 p.m.
Adults (18+): $25 Member / $30 Non-Member
Children: $15 Member / $20 Non-Member
About the Artist:
Peter Paone is an acclaimed artist and teacher who has worked in painting, printmaking, and drawing for over seven decades. Born and raised in South Philadelphia, Paone studied at the Barnes Foundation and received a degree in art education from the Philadelphia Museum School of Art (most recently University of the Arts). He has held teaching positions at the Pratt Institute and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where he established and chaired the printmaking department.
Paone has exhibited across the country and the globe and he is a recipient of the prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship. His work is in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum, Art Institute of Chicago, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, Delaware Art Museum, Woodmere Art Museum, and the Michener Art Museum, among other institutions.
About Michener Art Museum:
Address: 138 S. Pine Street, Doylestown PA 18901
Website: michenerartmuseum.org
Hours: Wednesdays–Sundays, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Admission is free on the second Sunday of the month with support from Art Bridges Foundation.
Michener Art Museum is dedicated to preserving, interpreting, and exhibiting the art and cultural heritage of the Delaware Valley region. The Museum is named for Doylestown’s most famous son James A. Michener, a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and supporter of the arts. Home to a world class collection of Pennsylvania Impressionist paintings and a permanent collection that explores a variety of artistic expressions, the Michener has a reputation for its craft holdings, which includes the Nakashima Reading Room.
The Museum is housed on the site of the 1884 Bucks County Jail and is surrounded by the original prison walls, now part of the Patricia D. Pfundt Sculpture Garden. Michener Art Museum offers wide-ranging programming that nurtures a lifelong involvement in the arts, with rotating special exhibitions, artist conversations and studio tours, gallery talks, the Putman Arts Leader Lecture series, as well as dance and music performances.
