Noel's First Christmas, 1963
Oil on canvas
70 ½ x 48 inches
Estate of Joan Brown
Joan Brown's canvases from the late 1950s and early 1960s display an extraordinary fusion of abstract, highly expressive painting — Abstract Expressionism — with the recognizable subject matter of the Bay Area Figurative artists. In this painting, Brown's one-year-old son Noel sits in front of the Christmas tree, caught in an intimate but vibrant domestic moment the viewer is invited to share.
