LEROY NEIMAN (1921–2012)

LeRoy Neiman, a painter who became famous for his bright paintings of sporting events, has died at the age of ninety-one in Manhattan. William Grimes, for the New York Times, details Neiman’s life painting glamorous events likes the Cannes Film Festival, horse races in France, and even the Super Bowl for his Playboy column “Man at His Leisure.” Born in 1921, in St. Paul, Minnesota, he attended St. Paul School of Art (now the Minnesota Museum of American Art) and later the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. While critical attention eluded him, Neiman once told Art Magazine_ in 1995, “Maybe the critics are right, but what am I supposed to do about it––stop painting, change my work completely? I go back into the studio, and there I am at the easel again. I enjoy what I’m doing and feel good working. Other thoughts are just crowded out.”