Well, hello Alice Neel, it's nice to meet you.
I've not heard of or seen any of Neel's work until now. Thank you, Andrea for bringing her to our attention (though most others are probably very familiar with her.)
I, as Linda, enjoy seeing fresh interpretations of what portraiture can be. And I appreciate the emotion and in-your-face humanity that these paintings have. There are other things there, too, that I percieve: a kind of struggle against or impatience with "beauty". Is it possible that women grapple with that word or that stigma more than men? By putting beauty in quotes, I am signalling that I'm referring to the social concept of beauty. Not the "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" philosophy.
I get the feeling Alice wasn't all that keen on social concepts of beauty. Others may know how correct or incorrect I am.
'Beauty', like 'love' and 'truth' and 'bargain', will always be hard to definitively define.
So, now that I've taken that off the table for myself,
, I will say that 'taste' is a made-up thing. Like curfew and taxes. It's a construct made by those who want to be in control. And I try not to buy into that. I won't wear black socks with shorts, but that's as far as my taste obedience goes.
I have a feeling Alice may have been bolder than me.
Or maybe not.
I find myself constantly wanting to know the artist that does any certain work. I can't just be content to see the work as something on it's own. It always, for me, is something created. And so I want to know the creator. Is it conceit to think that I can know the creator by just looking at what he/she created? Is it still art if one creates something gloriously beautiful and yet has put none of their soul into it? This could be a whole nother can of beans.
Alice Neel is okay in my book. She was expressing herself in what is obviously (to me) a true and honest way, and she found a language in visual media (not just lines or colors on a flat surface). Portraiture? People have discussed the point and meaning and measure of portraiture on this forum before, but I am beginning to see that "portrait" is a broad term, indeed.
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