|
COPYRIGHT 2001 The Dallas Morning News
Byline: Terry Box
May 27--Most of Bill Neale's cars rip across his canvases.
In one painting, a rare Corvette Gran Sport powers through a curve, its back tires clawing for traction against the backdrop of a towering, stormy sky. In another, a Shelby GT 350 Mustang flies down a straight, trailing track dust from its rear wheels and wisps of air from its top.
Motion is a big part of Mr. Neale's method. And with automotive art growing in popularity, Mr. Neale is about as active -- three years into "retirement" -- as some of the hyper-kinetic cars he portrays in his Dallas studio.
"I'm way behind on everything," said Mr. Neale, 75, who is largely unknown in Dallas but is a pioneer of international repute in automotive art circles. "Either through luck or lightning, I've had the opportunity to do a lot of things I truly like. And I think I could stay busy painting now eight hours a day if I wanted to."
The demand for automotive art -- driven mostly by affluent, car-crazy Baby Boomers -- has grown to the point that it is probably about as big now as Western art was 10 or 20 years ago, say those in the business.
For artists like Mr. Neale, that means juggling two or three commissioned works at a time and occasionally finding buyers willing to pay $25,000 or more for a piece. Most of...
Read the full article for free courtesy of your local library.
|
Bookmark this article
Print this article
Link to this article
Email this article
Digg It!
Add to del.icio.us
RSS
