Editing Alice Neel (section)

===Depression era===
There Neel painted the local characters, including [[Joe Gould (bohemian)|Joe Gould]], whom she depicted in 1933 with multiple penises, which represented his inflated ego and "self-deception" about who he was and his unfulfilled ambitions. The painting, a rare survivor of her early works, has been shown at [[Tate Modern]].

During the Depression, Neel was one of the first artists to work for the [[Works Progress Administration]].<ref name="Hoban">Hoban, Phoebe (April 22, 2010). [https://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/25/arts/design/25neel.html?_r=0 "Portraits of Alice Neel's Legacy"], ''The New York Times''. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180205130001/http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/25/arts/design/25neel.html?_r=0 |date=February 5, 2018}}. Retrieved August 6, 2014.</ref> At the end of 1933, Neel was offered $30 a week to participate in the [[Public Works of Art Project]] (PWAP) during an interview at the [[Whitney Museum of American Art|Whitney Museum]].<ref>{{Cite book|title=New York City WPA art: then 1934–1943 and ... now 1960–1977.|last=Parsons School of Design|date=1977|publisher=NYC WPA Artists|location=New York|language=en|oclc=5208196}}</ref> She had been living in poverty.<ref name="Southgate p. 96" /> While Neel participated in the PWAP and the [[Works Progress Administration]] (WPA)/[[Federal Art Project]], her work gained some recognition in the art world. While enrolled in these government programs she painted in a realist style and her subjects were mostly Depression-era street scenes and Communist thinkers and leaders. Some of these sitters included [[Mother Bloor]], the poet [[Kenneth Fearing]], and Pat Whalen.<ref name=":0" />  She had an affair with a man named Kenneth Doolittle who was a heroin addict and a sailor. In 1934, he set afire 350 of her watercolors, paintings and drawings.<ref name="Heroes and wretches" />{{#tag:ref|Southgate asserts that a man ruined "scores" of her works by slashing them.<ref name="Southgate p. 96" />|group="nb"}} At this time, her husband Carlos proposed to reunite, although in the end the couple neither reunited nor officially filed for divorce.<ref>[http://www.aliceneel.com/biography/1930.shtml "Biography  1930s"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304054646/http://www.aliceneel.com/biography/1930.shtml |date=March 4, 2016}}, AliceNeel.com, Retrieved August 6, 2014.</ref>

She consorted with artists, intellectuals, and political leaders of the [[Communist Party USA|Communist Party]], all of whom became subjects for her paintings.<ref name=":0" /> Her work glorified subversion and sexuality, depicting whimsical scenes of lovers and nudes, like a watercolor she made in 1935, ''Alice Neel and John Rothschild in the Bathroom'', which showed the naked pair peeing.<ref name="Heroes and wretches" /> In the 1930s, Neel gained a reputation as an artist, and established a good standing within her circle of downtown intellectuals and Communist Party leaders. While Neel was never an official Communist Party member, her affiliation and sympathy with the ideals of Communism remained constant. In the 1930s, Neel moved to the [[East Harlem|Spanish Harlem]] and began painting her neighbors, specifically women and children.