Alice Neel @ Zwirner and Wirth through 6/20/2009

The nudes exhibit expressionism's primitive delineation, stylized anatomy and unvarying black outline,  a mote fending off the ground. Neel treats the visages of her subjects symbolically. Their hands and feet are contorted. Their meager, bohemian interiors are joyless. The compositions can be rich and complex. None of these works display Neel's signature style, but portraits done over the next 50 years are marked with the the same tropes. The revolution in Neel's work was the background, where sketchy naturalism flattens, exhausting the entire vocabulary of abstraction.  Throughout her career Neel did with portraits everything it was possible to do with painting