Random thoughts on Elizabeth Neel

From Interview Magazine

NEEL: My parents were supportive, essentially believing my decision came from some rational,
meaningful place. So I went back and started painting at about 23. I started right from the beginning, going to figure class where they set up a model. I was really familiar with representational figurative painting because I’ve been around it all my life.

Neel earned a degree in History from Brown and was seriously considering going to law school before making a big life-shift and delving into painting. This means a lot to me as someone who started painting at 22. An absolute beginner, bored with the analytical, I what-the-hell registered for Beginning Drawing... and never looked back at nursing, or mathematics, or psychology...

From the same interview:

NEEL: I used to be jealous of Andrew because he could go back to the file that was untouched, before all of the things in it got screwed up. But then I realized that’s part of what painting does. I’m the kind of person who likes to keep all of my options open all the time. It forces me to take risks, make choices, bite the bullet. That’s when the best things happen.

I think this boldness permeates all of Elizabeth Neel's work. Every mark, every gesture, is confident. I don't personally see her work as "violent" (although she loosely admits to it being so), but I think these risks/choices/biting-the-bullet is so prominent that it makes the viewer kind of uncomfortable, like violence. Definitely a quality that separates the art student from the artist and, thus, something I want to keep in mind in those moments of hesitation when I work.


I really like how these works, both featuring dogs but in almost polar situations (sex and fight, respectively), are so stylistically connected, creating a continuous narrative:


The Humpndump (2008; Oil on canvas)


Good vs Evil (2009; Oil on canvas)


Elizabeth Neel's sculptural/installation work is also really intriguing. Images from her 2011 solo show at the Pilar Corrias Gallery in London create an interesting juxtaposition (and compliment) to the above dog works:










What are your thoughts on Elizabeth Neel?