A Letter to Alice Neel

In conjunction with Alice Neel’s portrait of Joey Skaggs at the “Alice Neel: Beautifully Imperfect” exhibition at the Serralves Museum in Porto, Portugal, July 16, 2026 to January 17, 2027, Skaggs was asked to write a letter to Alice Neel from his perspective today. As display in the gallery with other artist’s letters, here is his:

“Dear Alice,

It’s been sixty years since our chance meeting at the Sonnabend Gallery in New York. You were sixty-seven, and I was twenty-two. We immediately connected over our shared rage about the war in Vietnam. We were in the minority in those days, but we were both accustomed to that. You made your statements through paintings, while I took my critique to the streets.

A lot has changed since you were here, but much of what outraged us then still remains. The world has not become a simpler or kinder place.

I’ve been wondering who you might choose to paint now if you were still alive. In the spirit of our shared social sensibilities, I decided to merge our approaches and instructed AI to create a satirical portrait of President Donald Trump in your style.

It’s outrageous, I know, but I bet you’re laughing!

With love, Joey Skaggs.”

Follow this link for the story of how the portrait of Joey Skaggs by Alice Neel came to be.