Dynamic and forward thinking this
unconventional retrospective monograph
takes its cues from Alice Neel´s life and work-
at once intimate, powerful, and bursting with
color.
Alice Neel was one of the great American painters of the twentieth century and a pioneer among women artists. A painter of people, landscape and still life, Neel was never fashionable or in step with avant-garde movements. One of the reasons I painted was to catch life as it goes by, she explained, right hot off the griddle. This beautifully designed volume takes a unique approach to the exhibition catalog, highlighting Neel´s understanding of the fundamentally political nature of how we look at others, and what it means to feel seen. Long a favorite of portrait lovers, Neel has recently gained an even wider 21st-century audience appreciative of the searing candor with which she viewed the world, the depth of her humanity, and her championing of the underdog. This beautifully produced catalog features a thoroughly modern design, as well as an essay by renowned critic Hilton Als and poetry by Daisy Lafarge.
