C.S. McNeil

Canadian figurative artist, C.S. McNeil, specializes in acrylic nudes, mixed media paintings, and commissioned portraiture. She divides her time between her home in Toronto, Canada, and her studio-away-from-home, here in Miami.

McNeil's work very simply and plainly celebrates "the way light attaches itself to a woman".

Her use of varied flesh tones, exaggerated palettes and heightened contrast has been likened to the figurative works and celebrated portraiture of Lucian Freud; while still beholden to a stripped-down simplicity (lone subjects –often nude and isolated against 'barely there' backdrops), that has offered up premeditated nods toward the earlier works of Antonio Tamburro and unplanned winks at the "Naked Beauty" of Alex Katz.

McNeil has a unique affinity for 'the art of allure'. Even the most casual spectator cannot overcome the urge to step closer to examine the texture of a high relief dress, a deep haunting stare, or the play of light and shadow on a piece of fabric. For it is at this fleeting moment that the artist succeeds in captivating us by welding together viewer and composition, the real and the imagined, into one. Through the application of resins and varnishes, she creates a lucidity through which the viewer is drawn –even deeper– ‘into the moment’.

Driven by innate artistic talent and heartfelt passion, McNeil rediscovered her 'first love' of painting after a two-decade career in Advertising, Branding and Marketing Design. Despite having sustained severe injuries to her right-hand in 2011, that passion prevails– she continues to reclaim and refine her craft today.