Olivia Laing, Hilton Als and Extra on the “Unapologetic” Artwork of Alice Neel

In 1970, Alice Neel created probably the most startling depiction of Andy Warhol in artwork historical past. The American pop artist’s regular public persona – bottled-up efficiency replete with make-up, wig and sun shades – was radically dismantled right here. Made simply two years after he was shot by Valerie Solanas, the portray – of a topless Warhol along with his eyes closed and mangled torso scars on present – has a quiet, probing vulnerability that’s emblematic of Neel’s creative mission: to strip away the protecting masks individuals placed on in public. “As for individuals who need flattering work of themselves, even when I needed to do them, I wouldn’t know what flattery is,” Neel wrote in 1976. “To me, as Keats mentioned, magnificence is fact, fact magnificence … I paint to attempt to reveal the battle, tragedy and pleasure of life.”

This extraordinary portray is featured within the Barbican’s new survey, Alice Neel: Sizzling Off The Griddle, alongside depictions of New York’s distinguished Twentieth century cultural figures; artwork historian Linda Nochlin, poet Frank O’Hara, communist educational Harold Cruse, and downtown personalities related to Warhol’s Manufacturing unit. Outdoors of superstar, Neel spent her life portray ‘on a regular basis’ those that she met whereas residing in Spanish Harlem in New York, like a Vietnam struggle draftee, a ribless tuberculosis affected person, and pregnant ladies bulging with nerves. “One of many major motives of my work was to disclose the inequalities and pressures as proven within the psychology of the individuals I painted,” mentioned Neel, whereas the present’s curator, Eleanor Nairne, explains: “She didn’t make any photographs with out there being a form of political heartbeat to them.”

A self-confessed “anarchic humanist” and “collector of souls,” with this exhibition (and former exhibits on the Pompidou in Paris and the Met in New York) Neel is lastly getting her due as probably the greatest portrait artists of the Twentieth century. Right here, 4 writers, curators and artwork historians – Olivia Laing, Hilton Als, Katy Hessel and Eleanor Nairne – converse on Neel’s creative legacy.

“The primary work I noticed was Alice’s portrait of Andy Warhol, which I wrote about on the finish of The Lonely Metropolis. It blew my thoughts. Nearly each different picture of Andy in existence is of the cartoon model, the masks he made for himself, however Alice noticed straight by way of it. She’s so tender with him, however so extremely revealing. She paints him topless, in his bizarre trousers and pointy sneakers. You possibly can see the corset he needed to put on after Valerie Solanas shot him. You possibly can see his scars in addition to his little breasts. His face is beautiful. You possibly can really feel how a lot he longs to be lovely. She’s performed him out in probably the most flattering, girlish pastel shades however she’s additionally stripped him naked.

“[My favourite thing about Neel’s work is] the stringent honesty, the relaxed strokes, the humour, the exacting, witty method she seems at individuals. Take the portrait of Frank O’Hara. Brutal! He was so sizzling, and she or he makes him look sleazy and hungover, with epically dangerous tooth. It provides a lot depth to the biographical document, to take a look at how Alice noticed an individual. Or the portray of the performer Annie Sprinkles, in lingerie, tits out. It’s so unapologetic and bodily confronting. She lets individuals be themselves.

“Alice was in such a wide range of worlds. And he or she opens them as much as you. She makes a heat introduction. There was a present at Victoria Miro a number of years in the past, Uptown, curated by Hilton Als. I went in alone, and it was like being in a room filled with highly effective individuals. They had been virtually vibrating with presence. I feel she solutions one thing proper now that’s a couple of need for unfiltered actuality, for connection. Her individuals look again.”

“Her means to not look away from the sitter, to not look away from the soul, and to see the rewards and damages of being human, is exceptional” – Hilton Als 

“Whereas finding out artwork historical past at Columbia College within the early to mid-Eighties, a nice professor, Kenneth Silver, confirmed a portrait that Alice had painted of Linda Nochlin. I used to be so interested in this work, so I went to the library and began studying a e book of her work, and I realised that a variety of the portraits that she had performed had been of individuals of color in Harlem, the place she lived. I used to be so fascinated by her depiction of that group. This was throughout a time when there was no such factor as African-American research or African-American artwork – there was no division till 1991. So she was a tie to a group of those that weren’t not like the those that I knew rising up. I used to be additionally fascinated by this girl who had put her personal distinction apart to be able to see one other world.

“In 2017, I curated a present at David Zwirner in New York referred to as Uptown. Some time in the past, David [Zwirner] and I had been at a celebration, and I had mentioned, ‘Why haven’t you proven Alice Neel’s portraits of individuals of color?’ Six years later, he referred to as up and mentioned that there have been issues within the property that had modified, and would I come and do the present? It was such an unbelievable act of generosity on his half; we didn’t know one another very effectively. However it was a possibility for that work, that had such resonance for me as an undergraduate, to be seen. [Curating the show] was actually goose pimply as a result of her work is so highly effective that you could really really feel the souls of her sitters. It was virtually as if, collectively, this concept that individuals of color that she had admired or considered throughout her time residing in Harlem got an viewers. The images hadn’t actually been seen that a lot. It was a goose-pimply second for them to exhale, and to be in area.

“Alice’s politics get neglected, and her curiosity in different individuals. Given the place she got here from, she shouldn’t have ended up doing the work that she did. Her means to not look away from the sitter, to not look away from the soul, and to see the rewards and damages of being human, is exceptional.

“In a world dominated by motion – TikTok, Instagram, all of that stuff – it’s fantastic to be in an area the place every picture provides you pause, and that you’ve got reflection. Her work is reflection primarily based on reflection. So, to have these moments the place you’ll be able to really be along with a picture and to look into the picture and have it look into you is remarkably completely different than most picture consumption as of late.”

“I first got here throughout Alice Neel’s work after a tutor at UCL urged I have a look at her. I received this e book of hers referred to as Painted Truths, and as quickly as I checked out these work, one thing inside me modified. I’d by no means seen one thing prefer it. In a method, the idea was quite simple – they’re simply portraits, proper? However there was one thing so completely different about how she portrayed her sitters, and the way it was virtually like this portrait of Twentieth-century America, from the Thirties till the Eighties.

“She utterly attracts you in. The work are so expressive, and never all the time probably the most flattering, however they’re so intensely intimate. She captures life within the second of a second. You’re feeling such as you’re in that room with Alice, and you’ll inform what her temper was by the quantity of paint she’s received on the canvas. For instance, the Andy Warhol portray is simply so spare as a result of there’s nothing left of him. It’s like he’s a shell, and she or he captures that.

“[Neel’s work is popular today] as a result of she paints actually and in truth. They really feel so up to date, her work, it’s form of unbelievable. Even the freshness of the paint, the electrical energy of an orange, it will possibly virtually really feel prefer it was performed yesterday. There’s something so timeless about her work, the tales that she tells – they’re simply individuals. What’s wonderful is that you simply join with all these people who find themselves from every kind of various backgrounds. That’s the facility of nice artwork: to talk to so many alternative locations, eras, individuals, dynamics and backgrounds.

“It’s simply extraordinary that she was mixing with these crowds, however that she additionally didn’t discriminate. She could possibly be portray some of the wonderful playwrights, artists or glitzy particular person of her technology, however she provides equal prominence to her landlord’s son Benjamin, as a result of he’s value simply as a lot as an editor at Vogue. Illustration may be so highly effective. A 14-year-old would possibly go to the exhibition and really see themselves in it. For me, that makes all of the distinction.” 

“She’s a deeply political artist, and we reside in deeply political instances” – Eleanor Nairne

“There’s a depth of empathy that you simply see inside Alice’s work. On this post-pandemic second, I feel we really feel particularly attuned to artists who’ve that depth of human feeling. She painted virtually solely from life and she or he’s very attuned to the form of fleshiness of human beings – she actually revels in that. She’s additionally a deeply political artist, and we reside in deeply political instances. 

“She belongs to a lineage of artists who understood the concept of a really completely different idea of what portraiture could be. She hated the phrase portraiture, she referred to as them photos of individuals. In that distinction, we will hear an artist who is considering class and is considering the fussiness of portraiture as a style, serious about the irrelevance of artwork historical past. She’s serious about learn how to make an image of an on a regular basis particular person which may genuinely seize two issues: one thing of who they’re – that not possible, ineffable factor – but additionally one thing of the age that has formed them. We’re all distinctive people, however we’re additionally formed by structural situations of our age, and of the category and of the background that we’re born into. She mentioned her goal was to color ‘what the world has performed to them [Neel’s subjects] and their retaliation.’ She’s such a humanist.

“Now we’re in an amazing second of figurative portray. You would say that it’s extra trendy now than it has ever been. You possibly can identify so many people who find themselves influenced by her work: Jordan Casteel, Chantal Joffe. There are many up to date artists who really feel in dialogue with what she was making an attempt to do, which was to see an individual of their multiplicity, to see the complexity of an individual and the complexity of the forces that form an individual.”

Alice Neel: Sizzling Off The Griddle is on present on the Barbican in London till 21 Might 2023.