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Elizabeth Neel Grew Up Painting With Her Famous Grandmother. Now, Her New Abstractions Are Getting Attention in New York and London


Elizabeth Neel was eight years old when she got her first set of oil paints, a Winsor & Newton paintbox, as a gift from her grandmother, the late, great portraitist Alice Neel.

Neel’s earliest painting experiences were with Alice, working side by side. But there was never any pressure to follow in her footsteps.

“I liked to draw a lot and she wanted to encourage that, because she thought I was good and she had a connection with me. We had a lot of fun together,” Neel told Midnight Publishing Group News. “She was a great grandmother, even though she never allowed anyone to call her that. She was always Alice to us.”

“A lot of people will say to me, ‘It must be hard that your grandmother was always so famous’—but she wasn’t,” Neel added. “For me, she was this intelligent, charming human who made these beautiful, insightful pictures that we lived around all my childhood. I think it would have been really different if she’d been a man and she’d been properly famous—that could have been oppressive.”

Elizabeth Neel, Dog Dog (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Dog Dog (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Instead, Neel, now 46, was able to enter the art world on her own terms, first getting a certificate at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, followed by an MFA at Columbia University in New York. She’s shown her abstract paintings regularly since 2005, and she enjoyed a 2010 solo show at SculptureCenter in Queens.

The past few months, however, have been a particularly busy time, as Neel was preparing for not one, but two solo shows. “Arms Now Legs” is currently on view at her New York gallery, Salon 94. “Limb After Limb,” featuring paintings she originally planned to exhibit in a deconsecrated church, will debut next month at Pilar Corrias, Neel’s London dealer.

“The Salon 94 title references certain kind of transformative imagery in Ovid’s Metamorphosis, and the show at Pilar’s is a more John Milton-esque image of the world in a transformative state of turmoil, so I see the two as very connected,” Neel said. “Given the way I work, which is organically with a set of ideas, it was impossible for them not to be related. Everything that I’m reading about or thinking about or listening to goes into the work.”

Elizabeth Neel, Stranger's End (2021). Photo courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Stranger’s End (2021). Photo courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Each piece starts with raw canvas and a primer coat of clear acrylic polymer that keeps the painting from sinking in all the way through the fabric. It also allows Neel to use white to create lighter areas against the background, many areas of which she leaves untouched, to “preserve a lot of air in the canvas,” she said.

But unlike her childhood oil painting sessions with Alice, Neel chooses acrylic paint to create her many-layered works.

“When I worked in oil, it took so long for every layer to dry that I would get out of the headspace I needed to feel a kind of continuity in the painting,” she explained.

Neel has a deep bag of tricks at her disposal to achieve her complex compositions, sometimes folding the painted canvas to create a Rorschach-like effect, and employing a wide variety of tools in her mark-making. “I use rollers, I use rags, I use my hands with rubber gloves on—and once in a while, I do use a brush too,” she said.

Elizabeth Neel, Exchange Principle (2021), detail. Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Exchange Principle (detail, 2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Neel has been living and working almost exclusively at her childhood home in rural Vermont, pressing the barn space above her parents’ garage into service as her studio. The change of scenery from her longtime home in Brooklyn proved inspirational.

“It was incredible to be able to step out into a snowy landscape or a sunny world of grass and flowers. Much more refreshing than stepping out onto a concrete slab with loud noises,” Neel said. “It felt almost like being a hermit or a monk. It was frightening, to a degree, to begin making a show without any human context, but it was a challenge that ended up being really good for me.”

Elizabeth Neel's Vermont studio. Photo courtesy of Salon 94, New York.

Elizabeth Neel’s Vermont studio. Photo courtesy of Salon 94, New York.

She made one of two trips back to New York for the opening of her grandmother’s critically acclaimed retrospective, “Alice Neel: People Come First,” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in March. (The exhibition closed earlier this month.)

“I’m incredibly happy that she’s getting what I think is her due,” Neel said. “Alice is really inspirational for me. I don’t think I ever met a person who was more tenacious or had more guts in the face of lack of interest than she had.”

Elizabeth Neel, Darlest Dearing (2020). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Darlest Dearing (2020). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Alice’s struggles for recognition and financial compensation, which were documented in the show, were part of the reason her two sons were drawn to the professional world, becoming a doctor and a lawyer. But Elizabeth and her brother, filmmaker Andrew Neel, turned back to pursue creative careers. (He made a feature-length documentary about Alice in 2007, and is currently completing a documentary short about Neel that Corrias will debut during Frieze London in October.)

“I think that actually happens lot in creative families, where you’ll have a flip-flopping effect,” Neel said. The poverty that her father, Hartley Neel, and her uncle, Richard Neel, experienced as children drove them to seek more stable career paths—an impulse that Neel, who took the LSAT before entering art school, understands fully.

“Alice suffered terribly on a physical and emotional level at the hands of her art and the art world,” she said. “That’s not something that you jump into lightly!”

See more works by Neel below.

Elizabeth Neel, Ark Scenario (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Ark Scenario (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Ark Scenario (2021), detail. Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Ark Scenario (detail, 2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Following the Birds (2021), detail. Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Following the Birds (detail, 2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Eve 2 (2021). Photo courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Eve 2 (2021). Photo courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Sister (Sibling 1), 2020, detail. Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Sister (Sibling 1) (detail, 2020). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Blue Black Bleed (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Blue Black Bleed (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Eve (2021). Photo courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Eve (2021). Photo courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Exchange Principle (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

Elizabeth Neel, Exchange Principle (2021). Photo by Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York, ©Elizabeth Neel.

“Elizabeth Neel: Arms Now Legs” is on view at Salon 94, 3 East 89th Street, New York, June 30–August 27, 2021.

“Elizabeth Neel: Limb After Limb” will be on view at Pilar Corrias, 2 Savile Row, London, September 16–October 23, 2021.

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Hong Kong Collectors Finally Started Paying Attention to Local Artists During Lockdown. But Will It Last?


One of the most talked-about installations during Hong Kong’s recent art week was a colorful changing room inspired by artist Chan Wai Lap’s regular visits to shut-down public swimming pools last year. Fairgoers scoped out Chan’s paintings on the walls while a performer, a young man, changed his clothes and brushed his teeth as if there were no one around. 

Most encouraging to gallerist Angela Li, who presented the ambitious site-specific project at the Art Central fair, was the fact that visitors weren’t just coming by to look. They were also there to buy. Li sold the majority of the works on view at her stand, 80 percent of which were by Hong Kong artists. 

Chan Wai Lap, The Lonesome Changing Room at Art Central. Courtesy of the artist and Contemporary by Angela Li

Chan Wai Lap, The Lonesome Changing Room at Art Central. Courtesy of the artist and Contemporary by Angela Li

This represents a notable shift. Despite Hong Kong’s role as a global financial hub and one of the world’s most important art markets, the city has not historically produced art that collectors consider highly valuable. Few Hong Kong artists have international gallery representation and international dealers rarely show work by local artists at their Hong Kong branches. 

But after a year of lockdown—during which time collectors refocused their energy locally rather than flying around the world to see art—that seems to be changing. While blue-chip galleries such as Hauser & Wirth, David Zwirner, and Lévy Gorvy have achieved multimillion-dollar sales at Art Basel, work by Hong Kong artists was also moving quickly. 

“Most who bought my work are new clients,” the 32-year-old artist Chan Wai Lap told Midnight Publishing Group News. “They are based in Hong Kong but come from all over the world.” Many of these buyers are young and specifically looking for work by local artists, Chan’s dealer said. 

47 Canal’s booth at Art Basel Hong Kong 2021. Photo: © Art Basel

The reduced presence of international players at two of the city’s most important contemporary art fairs, Art Basel and Art Central, meant more exposure for local players. Even regional galleries from outside of Hong Kong, such as Vitamin Creative Space and TKG+, were presenting Hong Kong artists at Art Basel. Many dealers were pleasantly surprised to have sold to new Hong Kong-based clients. 

“Maybe this is a start; maybe the ecosystem already exists,” says Angela Li, owner of the gallery Contemporary by Angela Li. “Regardless, it feels like this is finally happening.”

Over the past year, buyers set new auction records for work by Firenze Lai, Chris Huen, and the late Matthew Wong, who was born in Toronto but grew up and studied in Hong Kong. At Christie’s Hong Kong evening sale on May 24, works by Huen and Wong handily exceeded presale estimates, fetching HK$1.4 million ($177,130) and HK$30.2 million ($3.9 million) respectively. The sale, however, set a new record for Hong Kong painter Yeung Tong Lung, whose painting Staircase (2011) sold for HK$625,000 ($80,514), nearly 3.5 times its high estimate.

Chris Huen Sin Kan, Haze, Doodood and Mui Mui in Shek O (2014). Courtesy of Christie's.

Chris Huen Sin Kan, Haze, Doodood and Mui Mui in Shek O (2014). Courtesy of Christie’s.

Artists and other creatives have historically struggled to maintain a presence in the city due to steep rents, but high-profile institutions such as the forthcoming M+ museum, the Tai Kwun Center, and the revamped Hong Kong Museum of Art—as well as new independent spaces and galleries—offer a growing number exhibition opportunities.

Meanwhile, the development of the West Kowloon Cultural District and art fairs from ART HK to Art Basel and Art Central have helped shift the narrative for private collectors. Hong Kong architect William Lim and his wife Lavina recently donated their Living Collection, which traces the development of Hong Kong art since the 2000s, to M+. Patrick Sun, whose Sunpride Foundation houses an LGBTQ+-themed collection, has been acquiring more work by Hong Kong artists ahead of a focused exhibition in 2022. 

“There have been many outstanding exhibitions on Hong Kong contemporary art in the past two years,” Sun said, citing last year’s “Next Act: Contemporary Art from Hong Kong” at Asia Society Hong Kong Center and “Luke Ching: Glitch in the Matrix” at independent space Para Site. “Perhaps this phenomenon is due to [travel] restrictions, or maybe it is a reflection of the under-representation of local art for a long time. I’m happy to see this burgeoning art scene of Hong Kong talents in all its manifestations.”

The new price points may encourage those who never looked at Hong Kong art to finally pay attention, said collector Alan Lau, chair of local independent art space Para Site and co-chair of Tate’s Asia-Pacific Acquisitions Committee. But for him, the value of Hong Kong contemporary art lies well beyond the market. “Collectors buy works that they can connect with, regardless of where they come from,” he said. “They live here. They love the city, and they have this sensibility.” 

Patrick Sun. Photo courtesy of Patrick Sun.

For the many expats who live in Hong Kong, local art provides a tool to better understand their adopted home. Jacobo Garcia Gil, who is originally from Colombia but moved to Hong Kong 13 years ago, acquired a work by Mak Ying Tung 2 from de Sarthe at Art Basel on Sunday. 

Garcia Gil, who began collecting local art in 2014 when he established his Divide by Zero Collection, says the category now comprises one-third of his holdings. “The artistic expressions seen in Hong Kong art are coming from very deep places in people’s psyches,” Garcia Gil told Midnight Publishing Group News. “There is a strong sense of identity shift and people exploring this transition. There’s an intellectual affluence in Hong Kong.”  

Yuri van der Leest, a Canadian-born collector who has been living in the city for more than a decade, has  also been focusing on Hong Kong art—including work by Andrew Luk, Stephen Wong Chun Hei and Luke Ching Chin Wai—since 2016. “The issues Hong Kongers grapple with are reflected back to me in the art on my walls,” Van der Leest said. “This helps me better understand my home and compatriots.”

Jacobo Garcia Gil at de Sarthe's booth at Art Basel Hong Kong 2021. Photo: © Art Basel

Jacobo Garcia Gil at de Sarthe’s booth at Art Basel Hong Kong 2021. Photo: © Art Basel

Hong Kong artists are facing new scrutiny both at home and abroad as anxiety over the implementation of last year’s national security law remains high—and demands renewed creativity. “Local artists are under a spotlight at the moment and this has positive and potentially challenging implications,” Van der Leest said. “We are getting new and exciting and engaging art that we might never have expected or encountered previously.”

Looking ahead, longtime supporters of Hong Kong art hope that the resumption of travel will serve to spread the gospel even further rather than accelerate a return to the status quo. “Ideally, Hong Kong artists should be internationally recognized,” Lau said. “The market may be just one stepping stone and offer them greater exposure and exhibition opportunities.”

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Palestinian Artist Khaled Jarrar Has Made an NFT to Call International Attention to the Plight of His Homeland


After 11 days of violence, Hamas and Israel announced a ceasefire early Friday morning. It was the worst bout of fighting in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza in seven years and one that shook every corner of the world.

Several months prior, Ramallah-based artist Khaled Jarrar began work on a series that he hoped would raise awareness of the 73-year issue of Palestinian occupation among the international community. To do that, he chose a medium very much in the news: NFTs.

Jarrar’s NFT, titled If I don’t steal your home someone else will steal it, launched on May 13, just as the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) began carrying out airstrikes in Gaza City, leaving around 119 dead.

The NFT is part of “State of Palestine,” a new blockchain project that sheds light on the confiscation of the lands of Palestine. Through the creation of an NFT, which has been minted and offered for sale via the Our Zora platform, Jarrar hopes to bring the issue of occupation to the crypto community and beyond.

“I used an NFT because it is the latest trend and I believe it will help bring awareness to the issues we Palestinians are facing now through art,” Jarrar said.

Artist Khaled Jarrar rests against an installation which forms part of his exhibition 'Whole in the Wall' at the Ayyam Gallery, New Bond Street, London. (Photo by Jonathan Brady/PA Images via Getty Images)

Artist Khaled Jarrar rests against an installation which forms part of his exhibition ‘Whole in the Wall’ at the Ayyam Gallery, New Bond Street, London. (Photo by Jonathan Brady/PA Images via Getty Images)

The idea for the project began several years ago. When Jarrar would go for daily walks in mountains near to his home in Ramallah, he would collect handfuls of soil. “This soil is our Palestinian land,” he said. “These lands are in danger of annexation, so I am taking earth from the land and putting them in jars to preserve a bit of the land—a bit of its memory before it is gone.”

This year, during the month of May, the artist walked from the village of Kaubar to gather the handful of dirt for the artwork. “I NFT the soil to mark the hypocrisy of Israeli occupation, the unending spectrum of social, economic, and ecological apartheid,” Jarrar said in a statement. “The project is borne from daily walks around mountains of the occupied Palestine, where Israeli settlers continue to grab land and prevent farmers and hikers from accessing what is rightfully, for centuries, been ours.”

Jarrar’s digital artwork reveals an animated image showing a valley in the West Bank that has been overtaken by Israeli settlement homes that digitally appear across the screen. The valley pictured is located between the villages of Kobar and Jibiya, which is controlled by Israeli settlers who moved from the nearby Israeli settlement of Halamish, also known as Neveh Tzuf, to live under the protection of the Israeli army.

The unique NFT, which is accompanied by a jar of Jarrar’s collected fertile soil from Palestine sent to the purchaser’s address, is created in conjunction with Strc prst skrz krk (SPSK), a blockchain-focused collective that aims to connect the disparate worlds of art to the crypto community in order to support difficult and challenging works of contemporary art.

Jarrar, now a full-time artist, was previously a presidential body guard under Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from 1969 to 2004. In 2002, Jarrar was shot in the leg by Israeli snipers during the invasion of Arafat’s compound. After he was injured, he turned to art as a way to bring more awareness regarding issues of freedom, identity, equality, and resistance in Palestine.

In 2014, his work was included in the New Museum show “Here and Elsewhere”—though Israeli authorities prevented him from traveling to the United States at the time. In 2018, he came to New York to sell vials of his own blood outside the New York Stock Exchange.

Khaled Jarrar's stamp of the State of Palestine.

Khaled Jarrar’s stamp of the State of Palestine.

At the third edition of the Crypto and Digital Art Fair (CADAF) in Paris, which runs from June 17 through 23, SPSK will present State of Palestine Postage Stamp, a unique NFT edition of another Jarrar work, his “Palestinian Postal Stamp” series.

For the series, Jarrar utilized the postal service of various national governments to create the first stamp of the State of Palestine in 2010, two years before the U.N. recognized Palestine as a non-member observer state. While France rejected the stamp at the time, it has now reversed its decision and agreed to print a limited-edition run.

“The violence and censorship that has been forced upon us will not permit us from creating our art,” Jarrar said. “Art is the language that we are talking now.”

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