Neith Nevelson
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Contents |
[edit] Life
Known mostly for her vivid color schemes, slight variations of three main subject matters (horses, nude women's bodies and male faces), and for her 'unschooled' techniques, Neith (McCrea) Nevelson (New York City b. 1946-- ) never thought she would become a professional artist, not even growing up in the household of her grandmother, Louise Nevelson (1899-1988), one of the world’s premier 20th Century sculptors.
Neith, one of three siblings, is the eldest daughter of Mike Nevelson, Louise Nevelson's only son. Her other sisters from different marriages are Elsbeth and Maria Nevelson; the latter went on to found the the Louise Nevelson Foundation.
Neith’s childhood was different in many ways, even difficult. Much of Neith's schooling, just like much of her artistic style, was sporadic, which may help to explain why her art is also fluid, stylistically eclectic, and unhampered by technicalities or methodologies.
Neith's longest stint at a 'formal' education was at the Accademia di Belle Arti, in Florence, Italy, though she was expelled from the academy after a few months for her persistence in painting what she eventually became known for-- faces, women and horses-- and not what was required of the curriculum, mostly still life drawings and landscapes.
Away from scholarly surroundings, Neith would go on her own way and use a wide array of stylistic forms and categories to paint-- mostly Cubism, Expressionism, and even Surrealism.
A failed student, Neith's first exhibition took place at a gallery called Galleria Nuova in Florence, in 1974, to modest success. Even back then, patrons and gallery owners seemed to have noticed something promising in the emerging artist. The burgeoning new style of the young artist included mythological half-men and half-horses which, years later, in an exhibition catalogue called Neith Nevelson: In the Middle of the Night, Wendy Blazier, would interpret as Neith's personal philosophy about life in general; an artistic endeavor which would say just as much about her interests in art as a personal language about who she was as a person.
Ironic as it may seem, it doesn't seem that at this time Neith took art very seriously. She painted, but with disinterested curiosity. What fueled her interest and consumed most of her free time was politics and, in fact, it was politics that made her a cause celebre in the 1970s in Europe and the states.
On January 13, 1974, an abortion clinic was raided in Italy. The abortion clinic, according to UPI, performed up to 6,000 illegal abortions a year funded, mostly, by volunteer assistance and Italy's influential Radical Party, a left-to-liberal group which to this day continues to generate controversy in Europe. Neith, along with a group of other people, most notably Gianfranco Spadaccia were arrested charged with "complicity in abortion" and taken to a penitentiary run by Catholic nuns, where, according to the New York Times and the Washington Post, Neith stayed for a month under arrest before being given conditional freedom pending the trial.
It was a bleak moment in Neith's life. Technically freed pending trial, Neith's future in Italy didn't seem that promising. In fact, it seemed quite bleak. The possibility of spending years in prison did not appeal to her at all, specially after experiencing first-hand what went on in those women's penitentiaries. However, where would she go? In New York City, it would be easy to be recognized and extradited back to Florence.
With nowhere to go, she called a close friend from South Florida for advice. Her friend, after listing all the choices, invited her to be her guest for a few months in Miami, until the abortion case would settle. Neith, unsure, made the decision that would change her life forever. Wanting to avoid possible jail time, she fled Italy and, a few days later, arrived in Miami. It was supposed to be a short stay which has lasted to this day, more than thirty years later.
[edit] Works
It is difficult to place Neith’s works in any particular art category, again, something that has made art-critics call her an Outsider artist.
Over the past three decades, Neith’s thematic interest has changed little and, as pointed by Forrest Norman in a New Times they have continued to convey vivid images that are "visceral, fast, and nearly violent." Neith, of course, has had many influences, most notably Cubistic (most of her work from the 1990s is cubistic in nature), and also surrealistic of which Salvador Dalí’s influence is undeniable, (Dalí and Neith were friends in the 1960s). In fact, she claims that after they met at an Andi Warhol opening in 1965, Dalí became obsessed with her breasts and, unrelenting, would call Louise's studio almost everyday asking for her grandmother. Louise, who had become used to Dalí's daily phone calls, would often answer the phone and boast of telling the surrealist master, "Dalí, dear, she doesn't want you" before hanging up the phone.
Neith’s oeuvre, though, reflects something which does not seem derivative, as a critic for the Miami Herald described her 1991 exhibition, "In the Middle of the Night". The critic went on to say that well-intentioned and with “lots of heart,” Neith’s art proved, nonetheless, that “talent is not always passed down in the DNA.” Typical of most of art reviews on Neith Nevelson, this critic didn't elaborate nor does it seem that her criticism was based on anything less than a cursory review of what was available and not on what was promising about Neith as an emerging artist.
Neith’s major works have a seemingly rudimentary, unpolished, or hasty look to them. This is only at first glimpse for, once scrutinized carefully, one sees that each line, each dab of color, each silhouette and symmetry is perfectly balanced, almost like an ocean wave crashing chaotically into millions of water droplets before settling back into an effervescent smooth bed of sparkling azure. Of her paintings, Neith has concentrated on three main themes: horses, naked females, and male faces. With little variation, Neith has produced such a variation of the same categories, that often, if one is familiar with her work, one can recognize it as a Neith Nevelson almost immediately.
Neith’s naked women are amorphous, almost amphibian; women in concept not as real physical creatures. Aquatic-seeming at times, these amorphous-looking creatures usually have large holes in their bodies, usually under the chest area, though not always. Ironically, nothing in the facial semblance of these females gives indication that they’re in physical pain, or duress.
What’s more, their faces are inscrutable, implying, perhaps, that despite how much we suffer, at bottom, life will always be beyond our understanding. In an in-depth article published in the Tropic section of the Miami Herald in 1996, Meg McLaughlin described these as, women with “blank expressions” and big holes where their “heart should be.” She concluded by adding, “It will be a self portrait.”
Neith’s faces are similar to her females as far as their seemingly unfinished and rudimentary lack of physical proportions. Unlike her females, these faces are not symbolic but, invariable, young males with strong Afro-centric physical features. Never more than just faces, the viewer seems to intuitively elicit differing emotional responses depending on what is being depicted, or what one’s emotions may be.
With faces, Neith can produce various emotional responses to the same painting mainly by her technical use of conveying opposing sets of emotions at the same, similar to Simultaneity, an art sub-category of Cubism; for example, by the use of frowns at variation with the lips. More disturbing, these faces, at first, have a hostile-seeming semblance, keeping the viewer, us, captivated, if at a distant, uncomfortable level. Our dual discomfort begins when we realize that, like most of Neith's paintings, we seem to be intruding into the inner world of another person. It is an unwelcome invitation to which we cannot move away from. We, in turn, become the source of the transgression and the cause of the violence.
Horses, just like bulls were in Picasso's works, are emblematic of something more subdued in Neith’s art, something that may seem to be at odds with the strife and disturbance found in Neith's other women and faces. These horses, in fact, are gentle creatures, often symbolic of myth and/or an ideal. Earlier in her career, these horses were represented as creatures half-way between beasts and men. Aside from the fact that symbolically horses can represent violence, force or sheer animal sexuality and in spite of the fact that Neith often puts these horses at odds with one another, the overall effect, nonetheless, is one of playfulness, never unnecessary violence.
In an exhibition catalogue titled "In the Middle of the Night", Wendy M. Blazier interpreted these creatures as something akin to what she thought was Neith's personal philosophy about the incongruities in life and our inability to be wholy reconciled with it for, in reality, such yearning is nothing more than a romantic yearning, an impossible task.
To quote: "What emerges in Nevelson’s work is a romantic and often contemplative attitude... She manipulates these formal aspects into a cohesive whole which has as much to do with spontaneity as with controlled image."
Blazier went on to argue that she could see elements of a certain trend in most of Neith's paintings toward movement and energy. She concluded that this trend could well prove one day to be one of Neith’s great strength as an artist.
[edit] In Conclusion...
To this day, Neith Nevelson remains on the sidelines of the art-world. In many ways, she has chosen to go her own way by marketing, selling and distributing her paintings by herself, not through an agency or gallery. This may sound unusual but not impossible since many respected artists in the past have chosen to do the same. In all fairness, the art establishment still shuns down on Neith's art making it difficult for her to be regarded with any level of respect and making the transition from an artist drawn to the edge, to quote McLaughlin's article, to an artist highly regarded.
Neith's popularity, amazingly enough, continues to grow and her creativity, seems to be undiminished with time being as inventive as ever. In Miami, a now-defunct restaurant called "Soco" was designed mainly with Neith's paintings and motifs, Soco Restaurant. More important for whatever legacy she may leave, there is an ever-growing number of internet blogs and web-sites discussing Neith's works. Of these, the weirdest one has the following caption: seeneith, touchaneith, buyaneith, beneith, at Neith World." For art collectors, recently Art Price, the world leader in art market information, surprised some by listing two pieces by Neith Nevelson, one in particular with an estimated auction value of $100,000 US dollars. It seems that, ultimately, Neith Nevelson has lived her life as she wanted it-- like a true artist, on the margins. Retelling her life, she seems to have lived a life as she would have wanted, despite professional criticism or personal loses. Beautiful or not, great or not, Neith Nevelson's name continues to endure while many have perished along the way.
[edit] (Note...)
In 1992 right after Hurricane Andrew's devastating destruction of much of South Florida, a magazine interviewer asked Romero Brito how his house had weathered the hurricane. With some trepidation, Brito answered that everything had been destroyed, except for one of his treasured mementos: his Neith Nevelson painting.
[edit] Bibliography
Neith Nevelson, Neith Nevelson: In the Middle of the Night (Art and Culture Center of Hollywood 1991), with an introduction by Wendy Blazier.
Laurie Lisle "Louise Nevelson: A Passionate Life."
Diane Mackown (Ed) "Dawns and Dusks: Louise Nevelson."
[edit] External Database Links for Neith Nevelson
- One of the most concise (and informative) artist database compiled about Neith Nevelson.
- Basic Information about Neith Nevelson from ASKART
- Miami New Times article
- Louise and Neith Nevelson: "Inheriting the Nevelson Name!"
- A blog about Neith Nevelson from 2003
- Here's...Neith Nevelson!
- The Art of Neith Nevelson
- A web biography project in process
