{"data":{"id":"768","type":"artist","attributes":{"id":768,"topgoose_id":1632,"tms_id":768,"display_name":"Alfred Leslie","sort_name":"Leslie Alfred","display_date":"1927–2023","begin_date":"1927","end_date":"2023","biography":"\u003cp\u003eAlfred Leslie was an established Abstract\nExpressionist painter when, in 1962,\nhe embarked on a pivotal series of large-\nscale portraits of friends and colleagues.\nThough a dramatic departure from his\nearlier painting, Leslie’s interest in figuration\nwas already demonstrated in an earlier\nseries of Polaroid “mug shots” of studio\nvisitors, as well as in his experimental\nfilms and writing. For this new mode of\npainting, which Leslie called “confrontational\nart,” he sought to emphasize elements\nsuch as scale, frontality, and accuracy\nwhile eliminating color, space, light,\nand composition. The resulting grisaille\nportraits present monumental, three-\nquarter-length views of figures standing\nagainst planar gray grounds. Each is\npainted from separate eye-level views of\nthe sitter’s head, chest, torso, and\nhands, a composite technique intended\nto “democratize” all parts of the body\nand allow them to be viewed simultaneously.\nThrough these larger-than-life portraits,\nLeslie sought to create paintings that\n“demanded the recognition of individual and\nspecific people . . . straightforward,\nunequivocal, and with a persuasive moral,\neven didactic, tone.”\n\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn 1966 a fire in Leslie’s New\nYork studio destroyed most of his work.\nThis self-portrait, one of only four\ngrisailles completed after the fire, is a rare\nsurviving representative of his style from\nthe early 1960s. Here, Leslie shows\nhimself in his “worst light,” wearing a dour\nstare, a stained, rumpled shirt, and paint-\nsplattered pants cinched below a protruding\nbelly. This unflinching self-presentation\nand straightforward style have made the\nwork an icon both of self-portraiture and the\nnew realism of the early 1960s.\u003c/p\u003e","on_view":false,"artport":false,"biennial":true,"collection":true,"ulan_id":"500006228","wikidata_id":"Q577242","created_at":"2017-08-30T16:32:17.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-04-25T01:35:23.346-04:00","links":{"artworks":"/api/artists/768/artworks","exhibitions":"/api/artists/768/exhibitions"}}}}