YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – The Butler Institute of American Art this week acquired two major paintings by Alfred Leslie for its permanent collection.
One is the massive and popular “Americans: Youngstown, Ohio” piece that has long graced a gallery near the museum’s main entrance.
Leslie (1927-2023) was an American painter and filmmaker. He first achieved success as an Abstract Expressionist painter but changed course in the early 1960s and became a painter of realistic figures.
Leslie was a longtime friend of Louis Zona, executive director and curator of The Butler. His son knew of his father’s affection for Zona and met with him to discuss the possibility of selling “Americans: Youngstown, Ohio” to the museum.
The larger-than-life painting depicts 14 people, including Zona, and has become a beloved part of The Butler’s collection.
“High Tea,” an example of Leslie’s Abstract Expressionist period, was acquired by the Butler for $300,000. Separately, the Leslie estate gifted “Americans: Youngstown, Ohio” to the Butler and is now exhibited in the museum’s Dennison/Brown Gallery on the first floor. The two pieces now hang in the same gallery.
“The art of Alfred Leslie has been a major part of The Butler collection and extraordinarily popular with our Youngstown audience,” Zona said in a press release. “Leslie, in return, fell in love with our city. A day has not gone by when a Leslie painting or drawing is not on display in The Butler’s permanent collection galleries.”
Pictured at top: Alfred Leslie’s “Americans: Youngstown, Ohio” is shown at center, and the artist’s “High Tea” is at right. Both paintings are on display at The Butler Institute of American Art.