Even during this happy occasion, there is a pensive quality about the woman, as if she is contemplating the rigors of raising two babies at once. There are splashes of color, but the dark background is extremely prominent, and the baby nursing indicates the continuation of life and family, all themes that played strongly in Neel's personal life as well as her painting. She often paints families and children, and this almost compulsion to paint families indicates how important they were to her, and ultimately indicates that the loss of her child affected her work throughout her life.
It is interesting to note that Neel's work did not really begin to sell steadily or gain real notoriety until the 1970s. In 1979, President Jimmy Carter presented her with a National Women's Caucus for Art award for outstanding achievement, and her popularity gained right up until her death. Up until the 1970s, however, she actually sold very few paintings, and her work remained on the "fringe," a little too odd for many people to understand or purchase. It is also notable that her granddaughter, Elizabeth Neel, is also an artist who has exhibited her work in several galleries.
Alice...
Saddling them with the idea that every work must have some kind of recognizable theory that speaks to the viewers may be too much for some artists to manage, and it could shut down their creative process. As another critic notes, "[I]n Western culture, after all, art is associated with the free expression of a unique vision or the pleasurable cultivation of individual tastes" (Williams 2004, p. 3). Thus,
4. Alexandre Gabriel Decamps Figure 8. Alexandre Gabriel Decamps' "The Monkey Painter," 1833. (Source: http://dalihouse.blogsome.com/2007/04/26/beasts-get-the-babes Figure 9. ( Source: http://www.artandpopularculture.com/Image:The_Experts%2C_1837_by_Alexandre-Gabriel_Decamps.jpg) Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps was an artist who often used animals portrayed as human beings to satirize society and especially the formal artistic community of the time. He was opposed to falsity and pretentions and the often biased views of the academic art coterie of the time was a subject of some of his works. This can be
Internal Struggle for Identity and Equality in African-American Literature The story of the African-American journey through America's history is one of heartbreaking desperation and victimization, but also one of amazing inspiration and victory. Any story of the journey that fails to include these seemingly diametric components of the African-American journey is incomplete. However, African-American culture reflects both the progress of the African-American community, its external struggle to achieve equality, and
Martin Luther King Jr. was a black revolution leader who fought for the equal rights of blacks in USA. A priest by profession. A philosopher and hero of the blacks. Headed the Southern Christian Leadership and held peaceful protests. He was arrested for a similar protest in Birmingham. White priests sent him a letter in jail, asking him to end the demonstration and approach the court with his problem. He wrote this in reply to their
This dance was very powerful as it did scare the European people. They did not fully understand the reason behind the dance and the religion, but they were very clear as to what the apocalypse was and they wondered if the Indians were somehow summoning the end of the world. Not soon after this Ghost dance caused such a commotion, an Indian by the name of Handsome Lake who
Some artists, such as Aaron Douglas, captured the feeling of Africa in their work because they wanted to show their ancestry through art. Others, like Archibald J. Motley Jr., obtained their inspiration from the surroundings in which they lived in; where jazz was at the forefront and African-Americans were just trying to get by day-to-day like any other Anglo-American. Additionally, some Black American artists felt more comfortable in Europe
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now