LeRoy Neiman
Encyclopedia
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
known for his brilliantly colored, pseudo-expressionist paintings and screen prints of athletes and sporting events.
Early years
Neiman was born Leroy Runquist in Saint Paul, MinnesotaSaint Paul, Minnesota
Saint Paul is the capital and second-most populous city of the U.S. state of Minnesota. The city lies mostly on the east bank of the Mississippi River in the area surrounding its point of confluence with the Minnesota River, and adjoins Minneapolis, the state's largest city...
, the son of Lydia (née Serline) and Charles Runquist. He is of Turkish and Swedish descent. He was abandoned by his father at an early age, and adopted his stepfather's surname. Neiman and his mother, Lydia, were forced to fend for themselves. Neiman distinguished himself by drawing.
In 1942, Neiman left high school to enlist in the US Army, where he spent four years before returning to St. Paul to finish his high school degree.
Neiman studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (where he also later taught), the University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
, and the University of Illinois
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign is a large public research-intensive university in the state of Illinois, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system...
.
Playboy magazine and beyond
Neiman worked as an illustrator for department store Carson, Pirie, Scott & Co. in Chicago in the early 1950s alongside copywriter Hugh HefnerHugh Hefner
Hugh Marston "Hef" Hefner is an American magazine publisher, founder and Chief Creative Officer of Playboy Enterprises.-Early life:...
. After Hefner started Playboy
Playboy
Playboy is an American men's magazine that features photographs of nude women as well as journalism and fiction. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. The magazine has grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with...
magazine in 1953, Neiman's artwork was featured in several issues. To this day, Neiman continues to illustrate the "Femlin
Femlin
The Femlin is a character used on the Party Jokes page of Playboy magazine.- History :Femlins were created by LeRoy Neiman in 1955 when publisher/editor Hugh Hefner decided the Party Jokes page needed a visual element...
", a Playboy character that is featured every month on the jokes page. Neiman's early success is largely considered to be a direct result of his friendship with Hefner.
LeRoy Neiman continued to win major art awards and wide acceptance. He became famous largely because of highly exposed sports art (in large part due to his association with Playboy magazine) and has opened the doors for other artists in the field. He is considered by many the premier sports artist in the world challenged only in recent years by younger artists Stephen Holland and Richard T. Slone
Richard T. Slone
Richard T. Slone is an English painter.Slone was born in 1974 in Dalton-in-Furness, a northern English town. Slone is self-taught....
. Neiman produces about six different serigraph subjects a year, generally priced from $3,000 to $6,000 each. Gross annual sales of new serigraphs alone top $10 million. Originals can sell for up to $500,000 for works such as "Stretch Stampede," a mammoth 1975 oil painting of the Kentucky Derby. In addition to being a renowned sports artist, Neiman has created many works from his experience on safari, including "Portrait of the Lion," "Portrait of the Elephant," and "Portrait of the Tiger." Some of his other subjects include sailing, cuisine, golf, boxing, horses, celebrities, famous locations, and America at play. Much of his work has been done for Playboy Magazine, for which he still illustrates monthly.
Neiman works in oil
Oil painting
Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...
, enamel
Enamel paint
Enamel paint is paint that air dries to a hard, usually glossy, finish, used for coating surfaces that are outdoors or otherwise subject to hard wear or variations in temperature; it should not be confused with decorated objects in "painted enamel", where vitreous enamel is applied with brushes and...
, watercolor, pencil drawings
Sketch (drawing)
A sketch is a rapidly executed freehand drawing that is not usually intended as a finished work...
, pastels, serigraphy and some lithographs and etching
Etching
Etching is the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio in the metal...
. Neiman is listed in Art Collector's Almanac, Who's Who in the East, Who's Who in American Art, Who's Who in America, Who's Who in the World. His works have been displayed in museums, sold at auctions, and displayed in galleries and online distributors. He has begun to join the ranks of artists whose works can command prices over $100,000 for original works. At the December 2003 Christies auction of Playboy
Playboy
Playboy is an American men's magazine that features photographs of nude women as well as journalism and fiction. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. The magazine has grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with...
archives, his 1969 painting "Man at his leisure: Le Mans" sold for $107,550, a record for his paintings.
Personal life
Neiman married Janet Byrne in 1957. They live in New York City, their home base for over 33 years. Made up of double-height rooms that overlook Central ParkCentral Park
Central Park is a public park in the center of Manhattan in New York City, United States. The park initially opened in 1857, on of city-owned land. In 1858, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux won a design competition to improve and expand the park with a plan they entitled the Greensward Plan...
, this New York City landmark was originally intended for painters. Norman Rockwell
Norman Rockwell
Norman Percevel Rockwell was a 20th-century American painter and illustrator. His works enjoy a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of American culture. Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life scenarios he created for The Saturday Evening...
once lived there, as well as celebrities Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino was an Italian actor, and early pop icon. A sex symbol of the 1920s, Valentino was known as the "Latin Lover". He starred in several well-known silent films including The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, The Sheik, Blood and Sand, The Eagle and Son of the Sheik...
, Noel Coward
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
and ex-mayor John Lindsay
John Lindsay
John Vliet Lindsay was an American politician, lawyer and broadcaster who was a U.S. Congressman, Mayor of New York City, candidate for U.S...
. Neiman's painting studio, offices, and home are on one floor, his archives on another, his penthouse at the top.
Neiman continues to paint.