There has always been talk about "old art," the work an artist produces in his/her late years. But forget all that! George McNeil, who died at the age of eighty-seven in 1995, was producing paintings that were more audacious, outrageous and immensely energetic until the end of his life. In fact, the older he got, the more powerful his paintings became.

Years ago, he said, "There are three basic periods in a painter's life. First studying and learning up to age thirty-five. Then consolidating until you're fifty-five. Mature work follows to sixty-five. But, there's a fourth period, where you don't give a damn!"

Particularly in the late paintings exhibited at Salandar-O'Reilly Gallery, February 8 - February 26, 2005, we see George McNeil in the fullness of his creative power. Colors scream off the canvas; lines weave through shapes like a car racing on the thruway; drips, blotches, spatters add to the mayhem of life; George McNeil's life about what he saw, felt, remembered and imagined.

In the large painting, "Herbatim," (1987), a disconnected tortured face like a child's drawing in red with an open yellow mouth appears to be trapped by the chaos of life around him. Only an irregular rectangle outlined in white contains the nightmare image surrounded by a patchwork of shapes and colors with the riotous sensation of Broadway on a Saturday night .

Unlike the paintings of figures in the Seventies, McNeil uses a kind of shorthand image making in the late work. In the painting, "In The Palm of His Hand", (1991) a huge lemon yellow profile of a woman with strips of green wool for her hair, dominates the canvas. The torso is unimportant here, so McNeil eliminates it. What he portrays is an unattached shapely leg with a high heeled black sandal cradled by a hand. Both surreal and sexy, McNeil adds to the seductive vaudeville scene tiny cars, airplanes and graffiti stick figures.

Nothing escapes his roving eye in the carnival circus world that is New York. He stores bits and pieces in his mind, seen through the window of a bus as it glides along Fifth Avenue with its mannequined windows showing women in satin gowns. He passes through the cacophony of sparkling neon signs, or glimpses sexy young women gyrating on MTV; the disco dancers, the night life, the hustlers. Exciting, terrifying, grotesque, funny, childlike; Dubuffet, Art Brut, COBRA--it's all there, painted in glaring colors right side up, upside down, along the edges; a macrocosm of life, inwardly felt, outwardly observed, put down on canvas by an artist who was unstoppable.

McNeil, born in New York City in 1908, studied at Pratt Institue, the Art Students League and later with Hans Hoffman in Provincetown, becoming Hoffman's assistant. Afterwards, he received a Masters and Doctoral degree from Columbia University. He was Director of the evening school at Pratt Institute where he taught painting and art history. Summers were spent with his wife and two children in Provincetown and later Kerhonksen, NY.

He knew everyone: De Kooning, Gorky, Pollock, Kline, Krasner, Resika, Matter, Vicente, the whole New York crowd. But essentially, he was a man who preferred his own company and painting more than hanging out with the Cedar Bar crowd.

McNeil had a gentle face with bright blue eyes, but he could be fierce in a debate. At an Artists Talk on Art panel discussion at Landmark Gallery in Soho in the late Seventies, after listening to the other artists, he suddenly stood up, obviously boiling over with anger as he raised his arm, hitting the table with his fist, loud and hard. Immediately the shocked audience became totally quiet.

The young naked warrior in the painting, "Resolution," (1980) takes a samuri position, legs akimbo arms raised, ready to fight. His body dominates the entire space of the canvas from edge to edge. Yet, in opposition to the aggressive figure are two exotic birds, one perched on his lap, the other flying beneath him: his guardians, his other self?

One of McNeil's significant strengths is the use of contrast whether visual or symbolic that draws the viewer into the painting. "In Spite of All," (1984) a haunting, dreamlike picture, shows another aspect of George McNeil; introspective, self-questioning. The confident warrior artist in "Resolution," is now depicted as unsure with scarey memories of the past. His nude body turns away from the viewer; his angry face is twisted around like the head of a doll looking out. The two grim faced ghost figures beside him, act out a strange dance on the stage. But below, a comical cross-legged little fellow wearing harlequin pants is admonishing them. Is he the joker and they are the fools?

Like McNeil, the little guy has seen it all: the joy the sadness, the successes the failures; the ecstacy the pain. While, "In Spite of All," reveals the artist in a moment of vulnerability, McNeil's life was one of victory. He was always true to himself regardless of the times. As an outstanding Twentieth Century Expressionist, George McNeil painted from the heart, his brush eveready to record and interpret the astonishing spectacle of life.

Copyright © 2005 Hedy O'Beil