Returned to lender The Met accepts temporary loans of art both for short-term exhibitions and for long-term display in its galleries.
Jackie Curtis and Ritta Redd
Alice Neel American
Not on view
Jackie Curtis (1947–1985) was a prominent figure in Manhattan’s Lower East Side counterculture and had catapulted to underground notoriety in the late 1960s and early 1970s, entering the orbit of Andy Warhol. Neel shows the gender nonconforming performer sitting beside—and somewhat in front of—friend and occasional collaborator Ritta Redd, and both stare plainly back at the viewer. Curtis’s irrepressible personality and lust for the spotlight are on full display, from leaning forward to using one foot to shove Redd’s leg aside and quite literally cast Redd in shadow. Neel’s direct, attenuated linear application of paint accentuates Curtis’s reptilian features and elongated limbs. Curtis’s garish elegance is enhanced by the torn black pantyhose, through which one big toe has humorously emerged.
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