Joyce Reopel

Joyce Reopel (1933–2019) was an American painter, draughtswoman and sculptor who spent the first half of her career working on paper and gesso, in an array of old master media including pencil, aquatint, ink and wash, goldpoint — and an "impeccable" silverpoint. "n extraordinary draftsman, working in the difficult medium of silverpoint and goldpoint," New York Times reviewer John Canaday said, "In this meticulous, demanding technique she draws with full assurance, building strong forms, frequently eerie, with unfaltering definition.... perfection." Noting that her work "reflect[ed] a scholarly interest in Renaissance masters," ARTnews also noted that Reopel's "self-possessed, incisive technique [was] devoted not only to conventional subjects (anatomy, flowers) but to such less traditional themes as pregnancy and childbirth"

Alongside sculptor Mariana Pineda and painters Barbara Swan, Hyman Bloom, Arthur Polonsky, Mel Zabarsky and others, Reopel's work helped upend a conservative art world for "non-traditional" artists and clear a path for other women artists. In the process, she helped pioneer the American art movement known as Boston Expressionism, now in its third or fourth generation, with a lasting local and national influence.

Work The subject of more than eight individual exhibitions in New York and Boston, Reopel was a Boris Mirski Gallery veteran (1959–1966), admired for her virtuosity, finely wrought detail and a lush sensuality that could "convey a pessimistic modern humanism," while also reflecting an interest in history that was sometimes also reflected in her depictions of historical themes or classical icons.

New York Magazine called Reopel both "an artisan as well as an artist," commenting that "he artist seems consistently to search out that which lies behind the physical trait. And having discovered it, she presents it in whispers, with unusual understatement and economy." The results ranged from an expressive realism to a subtle surrealism and an outright grotesquerie, as well as, in the words of Art New England's Robert R. Craven, something "ream-like, an Arcadia populated by Rubenesque nudes who, in an Ovidian sort of way, intertwine with trees and vines."

In mature form, Reopel's subtly emotive, even melancholy, rendering of her subjects, was also often lyrical in the vein of fellow Boston expressionist Arthur Polonsky. Some of this was due to a distinctive palette evolved from glints of silver, gold and lead-gray in the early years to subtle tones of grayed blue and green when Reopel turned to oils. Reopel shared Baskin's fascination with the human form, and his interest in fine arts printing, woodcut, sculpture, etching and typography. Her earliest work can be seen in a 1953 version of T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men, which she illustrated and helped typeset as an art student. In 1958, she created pen-and-ink cover illustrations for Boston's Audience: A Quarterly Review of Literature and the Arts in an issue featuring several of Anne Sexton's poems and Arthur Polonsky's interior illustration. Reopel also went on to design many of the catalogues for her 1960s and 1970s aquatint, silver- and goldpoint exhibitions at Boston's Boris Mirski Gallery and founder Bella Fishco's Forum Gallery.

Education, Awards & Honors A graduate of the Worcester Art Museum School, Reopel also spent two years studying at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Arts at Oxford University. Earning recognition and laudits for her work, Reopel was a member of the Radcliffe Society of Fellows, A first cousin to scientist Paul Englund on her mother's side, Reopel was also a distant cousin to renowned French Canadian painter Jean-Paul Riopelle, Grand Officer of the National Order of Québec, on her father's. In 1955, she married painter and fellow Worcester Art Museum School graduate Mel Zabarsky. In 1976, a life-long interest in politics helped her win a two-year term in the New Hampshire House of Representatives. and the co-founding of the Portsmouth Historic District Commission.