Your cart
Close Alternative Icon
Close Icon
A book cover depicting a painting of a man with a dark skin tone sitting in front of a wall. He is wearing a suit and holds his head in one hand.
A book cover depicting a painting of a man with a dark skin tone sitting in front of a wall. He is wearing a suit and holds his head in one hand.
A look inside a book depicting text and a painting of a man.
A look inside a book depicting text and a painting of two young girls.
A look inside a book depicting text and a painting of a woman with a medium skin tone.
A look inside a book depicting text and a painting of two young girls with dark skin tones.
A look inside a book depicting two drawings of women.

Alice Neel: Uptown

$60.00

In Alice Neel, Uptown, writer and curator Hilton Als brings together a body of paintings and works on paper of African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, and other people of color for the first time. Highlighting the innate diversity of Neel’s approach, the selection looks at those whose portraits are often left out of the art-historical canon and how this extraordinary painter captured them; “what fascinated her was the breadth of humanity that she encountered,” Als writes.

The publication, which opens with a foreword by Jeremy Lewison, advisor to The Estate of Alice Neel, explores Neel’s interest in the diversity of uptown New York and the variety of people amongst whom she lived. This group of portraits includes well-known figures such as playwright, actress, and author Alice Childress; the sociologist Horace R. Cayton, Jr.; the community activist Mercedes Arroyo; and the widely published academic Harold Cruse; alongside more anonymous individuals of a nurse, a ballet dancer, a taxi driver, a businessman, and a local kid who ran errands for Neel.

In short and illuminating texts on specific works written in his characteristic narrative style, Als writes about the history of each sitter and offers insights into Neel and her work, while adding his own perspective. A contemporary and personal approach to the artist’s oeuvre, Als’s project is “an attempt to honor not only what Neel saw, but the generosity of her seeing.” 

This catalogue is published on the occasion of the 2017 exhibitions of Neel’s paintings and drawings at David Zwirner, New York, and Victoria Miro, London.

Hardcover