The Union Station offers guests the artful experience one expects in a vibrant and creative city like Nashville. Stunning, original architectural features combine with modern commissioned artwork to create a refined yet irreverent and wholly inspired atmosphere in guest rooms and common areas alike.
Work by some of the nation’s most talented artists contribute to the hotel’s interior landscape. They include:
Edie Maney
Born in Murfreesboro, TN, Edie Maney earned her B.A. in social work from the University of Georgia. She later began her art education by attending various institutions and workshops and studying with Anton Weiss for five years. Since 1984, Maney has exhibited her abstract work in multiple solo and group shows across the country. Says Maney: “The language of color is profound in my exploration of the painting process. It is color that determines the shape, motion, texture in the design and composition of my work. Emotional expression and mediation are the direct elements of my style. I portray a passion for life through my paintings. I create sensually bold and commanding works with acrylics and mixed media on canvas, paper, and wood.”
Michael Ray Nott
Michael Ray Nott is a Nashville-based photographer impassioned by the unexpected, haphazard multitude of things that can pop up in a picture—neon signs, buildings, random people—all colliding in a rush of activity. Nott takes pictures in public spaces, embracing chance encounters and random incidents. His photography developed naturally by way of recording the vibrancy of downtown Nashville. These are photos documenting the people, the music, and social issues that make up Music City USA. His work appears in a number of poster retrospectives from that era, including the books, The Art of Rock (1987, Abbeville Press) and Homegrown (2015, Texas Monthly Press).
Daryl Thetford
Daryl Thetford was raised on a hundred-acre farm in the small town of Bradford in the rural northwest corner of Tennessee. Thetford was always encouraged to pursue so-called “practical” avenues of work; however, his father, a forklift operator, and his mother, a beautician, recognized early on a certain artistic bent in their son. To Thetford’s delight, they enrolled him in oil painting lessons at age 9. Today, he begins with an original edited photograph, then digitally layers hundreds of other original images to create a full, cohesive composition. The resulting images range from culturally familiar individual pieces—such as bikes, cowboys, guitars, cityscapes—to his more esoteric series based on man’s inner struggle with modern society or the human sense of isolation in the noise of the modern world.
James Threalkill
Nashville native James Threalkill is a nationally recognized painter whose artwork celebrates a life well-lived. The vibrant palette, gamut of texture, and subtle abstraction exhibited in his paintings exude a feeling of vigor, entice a sense of spontaneity, and explore resonance within a still image. His style of work is best described as Expressive Realism, an area of painting that teases the tension between figurative and nonrepresentational art. Using people as his primary subject matter, Threalkill creates a connection between viewer and artwork that often leaves the viewer feeling as if they’ve witnessed a raw and intimate moment in someone else’s life. Threalkill continues to reside in Nashville.
Michael Weintrob
After two decades of navigating the music business and transforming the storytelling of image, photographer Michael Weintrob’s work spans all aspects of the industry. Created in the field where he has shot over 5,000 artists in-concert or his Brooklyn studio, Weintrob’s work covers everything from advertising to editorial needs. His work showcases the live element of performance and conceptual campaigns of portraiture, such as his Instrumenthead series, which is now over 400 artists strong. Weintrob’s work has appeared in Downbeat, Relix, Spin, Rolling Stone, Billboard, and The New York Times.