Family Portrait 2005

LeRoy Neiman made this painting of three big cats with bright daubs of paint and confident strokes. I love the way he hasn’t held back from using every colour under the sun! I can just imagine him wrestling with the canvas, trying to capture the essence of these wild creatures. He’s probably thinking about how to distill the animal’s raw power onto a flat surface. The paint looks quite thick, and it's as if he is sculpting the figures in globs of colour. Take that tiger's face; it is almost abstract, but those green eyes pierce right through you. Neiman's work reminds me of other artists who captured the energy of life through bold brushstrokes. There's a sense that he is in conversation with painters across time, riffing on their ideas, pushing the boundaries of representation. Ultimately, painting is about embracing uncertainty and finding meaning in the act of creation.