Alice Neel

Painter Alice Neel's portraits offer a poignant record of the anxieties and ambitions found in modern American urban society during the middle decades of the twentieth century. Although she also executed still lifes and landscapes, Neel is primarily known for her expressive portrayals of the human condition, which she began to paint shortly after moving to New York City in 1927. Born on January 28th 1900 in Merion Square, Pennsylvania, Neel grew up in Colwyn before attending the Philadelphia College of Art and Design (now Moore College of Art) from 1921 to 1925. She settled in New York and in 1932 began to work at a frenetic pace, painting the city and its inhabitants, often using her friends, family, and neighbors as subjects. While working for the Federal Art Project of the WPA from 1933 to 1943, she became a proponent of radical social and cultural reform, a commitment which strengthened her resolve to portray individuals from all walks of life and their personal struggles. source: National Museum of Women in the Arts http://www.nmwa.org/index.htm