Aliza Nisenbaum, Morning Security Briefing at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Basement Door Open onto the Guard Lounge Pet Wall, oil on linen, 75 x 95″ 2017
Aliza Nisenbaum was born in 1977 in Mexico City. She trained at the School of the Art Institute in Chicago and has been living in New York. Her large scale paintings are part of her social practice, focused on the strength of communities, painting people such as workers or immigrants – people who tend to be unseen. She surrounds the figures within a context of objects and settings to reflect their personal stories.
Her work is influenced by the murals she grew up with in Mexico.
Los Danzantes de Chalma, Fernando Leal, an example of work from the Mexican Muralist Movement, 1922
With strong artistic similarities to Alice Neel in figurative portraiture, Aliza Nisenbaum’s large scale angled figures lead the eye across the composition, and her sharp colors stay fresh, not overworked. Like Neel, Nisenbaum paints small areas of contrasting colors of yellow and purple, pink and green, next to each other to show the variety of skin tones in light and shadow.
“You have to pay close attention to the subtle nuance of every little character in their face, and colour is something that is very contingent. Everyone perceives it differently and it’s a myth that even within a particular race there’s a seamless colour. To me, that’s like a metaphor of how nuanced identity is. We’re very multifaceted in terms of our identities.” – Aliza Nisenbaum
Alice Neel, Ian and Mary, painted from life in 1971
Aliza Nisenbaum’s Portrait of an NHS Worker was painted from a zoom screen in 2020
Detail of hands from Alice Neel’s Ian and Mary (above), Aliza Nisenbaum’s Morning Security Briefing at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Basement Door Open onto the Guard Lounge Pet Wall (below)
Aliza Nisenbaum Team Time Storytelling, Alder Hey Children’s Hospital Emergency Department, Covid Pandemic, 2020 Oil on canvas 95 x 150 inches
Previously I posted four masterwork studies drawn by Fran O’Neill and I challenged you to identify them. I don’t have a good memory for names, but I did recognize the works in a general way, and I was impressed when you named all but one. I admit I didn’t recognize the landscape but the scene …
[vc_row type=”in_container” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” overlay_strength=”0.3″][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_position=”all” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ width=”1/1″][vc_column_text] The League is venturing into print arts! We asked Brian Lane of Print Zero Studios who was the most funnest, least stuffy printmaking instructor around, and he said “Nikki Barber is hilarious.” We met and hired Nikki straight off the plane from Thailand, where …
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! I thought I’d collect some turkeys for you. Most, at the moment of rendering, are inedible, but likely so is yours at this point. Be thankful you do not have to pluck, and enjoy the day. Look at this crazy painting by Alice Neel. There’s a squig of a dinner, hard outlines, …
Recently I posted about The Language of Color, in which I relate pinking shears to pink, the color. Please allow me to clarify. Pink didn’t come into our language until 1733, named after jagged edged flowers that were named after pinking shears. The shears were named pinking because the pattern they cut into the fabric …
Aliza Nisenbaum’s Labor Portraits
Aliza Nisenbaum, Morning Security Briefing at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Basement Door Open onto the Guard Lounge Pet Wall, oil on linen, 75 x 95″ 2017
Aliza Nisenbaum was born in 1977 in Mexico City. She trained at the School of the Art Institute in Chicago and has been living in New York. Her large scale paintings are part of her social practice, focused on the strength of communities, painting people such as workers or immigrants – people who tend to be unseen. She surrounds the figures within a context of objects and settings to reflect their personal stories.
Her work is influenced by the murals she grew up with in Mexico.
Los Danzantes de Chalma, Fernando Leal, an example of work from the Mexican Muralist Movement, 1922
With strong artistic similarities to Alice Neel in figurative portraiture, Aliza Nisenbaum’s large scale angled figures lead the eye across the composition, and her sharp colors stay fresh, not overworked. Like Neel, Nisenbaum paints small areas of contrasting colors of yellow and purple, pink and green, next to each other to show the variety of skin tones in light and shadow.
Alice Neel, Ian and Mary, painted from life in 1971
Aliza Nisenbaum’s Portrait of an NHS Worker was painted from a zoom screen in 2020
Detail of hands from Alice Neel’s Ian and Mary (above), Aliza Nisenbaum’s Morning Security Briefing at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Basement Door Open onto the Guard Lounge Pet Wall (below)
Aliza Nisenbaum Team Time Storytelling, Alder Hey Children’s Hospital Emergency Department, Covid Pandemic, 2020 Oil on canvas 95 x 150 inches
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[vc_row type=”in_container” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” overlay_strength=”0.3″][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_position=”all” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ width=”1/1″][vc_column_text] The League is venturing into print arts! We asked Brian Lane of Print Zero Studios who was the most funnest, least stuffy printmaking instructor around, and he said “Nikki Barber is hilarious.” We met and hired Nikki straight off the plane from Thailand, where …
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