Alice Neel: Richard | David Zwirner

Alice Neel:
Richard, 1967

Alice Neel (1900–1984) is widely regarded as one of the foremost American artists of the twentieth century. While the avant-garde of the 1940s and 1950s renounced figuration, Neel developed her signature approach by creating daringly honest paintings of the people around her.

Neel always worked from life and memory, and her ability to depict people with unfazed accuracy, honesty, and compassion displays itself throughout her canvases. Calling herself a “collector of souls,” Neel is acclaimed for not only capturing the truth of the individual but also reflecting the era in which she lived.

Alice Neel

Richard, 1967

Oil on canvas

59 5/8 x 45 1/8 inches (151.4 x 114.6 cm)
Framed: 63 5/8 x 49 3/8 inches (161.6 x 125.4 cm)

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Richard depicts Neel’s oldest son. Prominently featured is the blue-and-white striped armchair with wooden legs that appears in many of Neel's portraits, including her well known nude self-portrait, painted when she was eighty years old. Richard is casually dressed in a T-shirt and underwear, and his gaze is fixed on his mother.

Alice Neel, Self-Portrait, 1980, on view as part of Alice Neel: People Come First, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2021

Alice Neel, Self-Portrait, 1980, on view as part of Alice Neel: People Come First , The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2021

Neel painted Richard throughout his life, from early childhood into adulthood. About twenty-eight years of age at the time of this portrait, Richard was a recent graduate of Columbia Law School in New York. His first daughter was born in February of this same year.

Alice Neel, Richard, 1963

Alice Neel, Richard, 1969

“I do not pose my sitters.… I usually have people get into something that’s comfortable for them. Before painting, when I talk to the person, they unconsciously assume their most characteristic pose.”

—Alice Neel

Richard and his younger brother, Hartley, c.1950

Richard and his brother, Hartley, were Neel’s most frequent subjects, and thus accustomed to numerous, lengthy sittings. Here Richard appears relaxed, his legs splayed comfortably across the chair.

Alice Neel, Richard, 1967 (detail)

“Neel’s genius was to make us understand not just her interest in her subjects but why we are interested in one another.”

—Hilton Als, 2021

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Alice Neel

Alice Neel:Richard, 1967

Alice Neel

Alice Neel:
Richard, 1967