Charles Bell (1935 – 1995) was an American Photorealist and Hyperrealist, known primarily for his large scale still lifes.
With a subject matter primarily of vintage toys, pinball machines, gumball machines, and dolls and action figures (the latter frequently arranged in classical poses), Bell sought to bring pictorial majesty and wonder to the mundane. Bell's work, created in his New York loft studio on West Broadway, is noted not only for the glass-like surface of his works, done largely in oil, but also for their significant scale.
Bell died of lymphoma on April 1, 1995, at age 60. He had AIDS at the time of his death.[1] His partner of 22 years, interior decorator Willard Ching, died of AIDS-related illness three years earlier, in 1992.[2]
After Bell's death, Louis K. Meisel of the Louis K. Meisel Gallery became the owner of all intellectual property rights to the body of art created by Charles Bell. [3]
Bell's works are housed in the collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, and the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan, among others. [4]