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Art Review: Collection of Neel's work reinforces her wide range of talent
Saturday, March 03, 2001 By Mary Thomas, Post-Gazette Art Critic
Alice Neel, who was 84 years old when she died in 1984, held onto her outside-the- mainstream vision -- for her paintings and for her life -- so tenaciously that the critical recognition she deserved eluded her for decades. But the oeuvre of strangely powerful artworks that resulted retain a vitality that is finally finding a larger audience.
A retrospective of her work, which was organized by the Philadelphia Museum of Art and is there through April 15, comprises 88 paintings and watercolors.
The exhibition is at 5416 Walnut St., 2nd floor (elevator access), through April 14. Gallery hours are 1 to 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays and 2 to 5 p.m. Sundays. For information, call 412-431-5140.
When it opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, last summer, New York Times critic Roberta Smith called the exhibition "illuminating but insufficient," pointing out that while many of the works in "this often rewarding show" were strong, it was "top-heavy with the portraits of her last 25 years," mainly of her family or art world figures. Besides reinforcing the opinion that Neel was a "late bloomer," Smith said, the selection "short-changed" her "work in landscape, genre and still life."
You don't have to travel to Philadelphia to see an apt representation of Neel's work, including portraits, still life and a landscape. Nineteen works, mostly lithographs and silkscreens, from 1971 to 1983, are in "Alice Neel: Portraits in Print" at The Michael Berger Gallery, Shadyside.
It's not a comfortable world that's shown, but then neither was Neel's private one, which included poverty, an unsettled life and abusive relationships. Her subjects reveal themselves, as, for example, self-conscious, strained, disinterested or affronted -- as in "Victoria and the Cat," a 46-by-31-inch portrait of a standing naked child holding a languid green-eyed cat that drapes across her body but not enough to preserve her modesty.
Other works are as revealing, psychologically if not physically, but rather than being exploitive, Neel was just being herself: One of her most admirable and famed paintings is a nude self-portrait done -- with chutzpah -- when she was 80 years old.
One of the most moving works in a richly affecting whole is "Nancy and Olivia," of 1982, which illustrates Neel's skills with color and illusion. An improbable mix of blues and greens and anatomy that is exaggerated, bends wrongly or looks like the tray of a high chair when examined closely, works and combines to produce a magnetic whole.
Elements of Expressionism (the view through the window of "Blue Vase" is a painting in its own right), the Ash Can School, the social photography of the 1930s and '40s and even Pop glimmer in Neel's work, but the spark that gives them all fire came from her.
Pittsburgh artist and National Art Chair of the National Society of Arts and Letters Irene Pasinski Sailer suffered a stroke recently and is receiving rehabilitation at Life Care Hospitals of Pittsburgh. While she is unable to take phone calls at this time, cards may be sent to her at 225 Penn Ave., Pittsburgh 15221.
Several readers may have received the saucy announcement (after Michelangelo's "David") for "smallSCULPTURE2001," an exhibition sponsored by NSAL, Pittsburgh, that will open at the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh Gallery on March 10.
And, speaking of sculpture, the deadline is fast approaching for applications to be included in local programming for the 19th International Sculpture Conference, which comes to Pittsburgh in June. Installation and performance artists living within a 75-mile radius of Pittsburgh and working with the themes of art+performance+technology should submit bios and slides of their work by March 15 to APT Pittsburgh, 601 Wood St., 4th Floor, Pittsburgh 15222. Include SASE. Information is available at www.apt2001.org.
Kathleen Zimbicki's watercolor road show, "Travels with Z," part two, opens from 6 to 9 tonight at Penn Gallery, 3700 Penn Ave., Lawrenceville (412-802-8577). The opening for part one was last night at Studio Z on the South Side. Both shows run through March 31.
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