I usually feature little-known artists, but to start my four-part series about figurative art, “Go Figure!” I’ve chosen Alice Neel.
Neel is famous, but many of my readers might not be familiar with her work. Much of it is traditional portraiture but I’ve selected some of her more daring paintings to share.
Alice Neel is an unapologetic truth teller.
This is my favorite Neel painting. I’ve drawn many self-portraits but never had the guts to do a full-body rendering!
It seems Neel also had some hesitation:
All my life I wanted to do a nude self-portrait but I put it off until now — when people would accuse me of insanity rather than vanity.
The painting began at around age 75, abandoned for a spell, then completed at age 80. She passed away at age 84 in 1984.
Neel said:
…the reason my cheeks got so pink was that it was so hard for me to paint that I almost killed myself painting it.
Neel painted portraits of very famous people and also totally unknown subjects.
Famous for his Pop Art, Andy Warhol cultivated a controlled public image, including his signature silver wigs. But here, Neel paints him exposed and wearing the medical corset he needed after being shot in 1968 by Valerie Solanas
A tender portrait of a mother and child. So expressive!
Joe Gould was a Harvard-educated Greenwich Village eccentric who claimed to be writing an endless “Oral History of Our Time.” Neel painted him nude with multiple penises to satirize his inflated ego.
The painting was so scandalous that it was not publicly exhibited until four decades after it was finished.
Neel painted many double portraits
Many of her tamer paintings were similar to this one: a display of virtuosity that leaves the viewer wondering what the person is thinking.
Annie Sprinkle is a former porn star now a sex educator (she holds a PhD in sexology). She currently practices and promotes “sexecology.”
More about Sprinkle on wikipedia and her website.
Neel painted many pregnant women.
and a few babies
Neel was extremely prolific. See much more:
Working on the background flowers on my 4’ x 8’ painting Fish Without Bicycle. They are blue and purple as warm colors recede into the background. Most of the other flowers will be a fuchsia color unless serendipity takes me elsewhere!
14 second video
The painting is called “Fish Without Bicycle” from the feminist saying, “A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.”
I write about this in Chapter 19 of Art & Love. To download the chapter, click on the three lines next to the download button, then select “download”:
I’m working on a self-portrait in egg tempera on stone paper .
Awards! I received this silly medal in the mail:
But it does feel good to get some acknowledgment after all the hard work:
🥈Silver Winner, Nonfiction Book Awards (Nonfiction Authors Association)
🎖Finalist, Eric Hoffer Book Award in the Art Category
🎖Finalist, Next Generation Indie Book Awards in the Art category
And my fabulous designer Domini Dragoone gets the credit for these awards:
🥉Bronze medal, Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY) for Non-Fiction Oversize Cover Design
🎖Finalist, Next Generation Indie Book Awards in the Cover and Interior Book Design categories
UPCOMING EVENT!
Albany Public Library, July 29th, 6-8 PM ,1247 Marin Ave, Albany, California
I’ll be reading and presenting, including a hands-on demo of egg tempera painting.
NEW PODCAST RELEASE!
I enjoyed talking with Sam Horton on Soul-led Creative Women podcast:
Here’s a short clip:
Or the entire episode (1/2 hour)
WHERE TO READ OR BUY ART & LOVE:
Libraries:
Now available on the Libby app of the San Francisco Public Library. The audiobook is available on Hoopla.
I would be grateful if you could request your local library to acquire Art & Love. As an example, here’s the link to the “request a book” form for the Berkeley Public Library.
New Donation: Art & Love was accepted into the collection of the National Portrait Gallery Archive and Library in London. The book contains 32 original portraits.
Purchase
Order Art & Love at any independent bookstore, Bookshop.org or Amazon.
The audiobook is for sale on Spotify.com, Audible or Amazon
REVIEWS
You can read some of the reviews on Amazon or Goodreads, and if you’re inspired to write even a sentence or two, I would so appreciate it, as having lots of reviews triggers Amazon to show the book to more people. Here are the direct links:
Thank you!!
80 feet of wall and a lot of sun in 5 days! My mural in Andros, Greece for the North Andros Cultural Center is done! So grateful for the opportunity to come here and paint!
Click imiage to reveal link of mural video
Amos Goldbaum website.
Here is Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit”, a song from the psychedelic sixties. It was written by Grace Slick, performed in this video by Grace Slick and The Jefferson Airplane, live on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.
I like to call the song “Go Ask Alice” hence the tie in with Alice Neel.
Lora
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