New American Paintings

06/16/2026

A heartfelt congratulations to NAP Alum Njideka Akunyili Crosby (MFA Issue #93, 2011) who, with The Obama Presidential Center, unveiled the first official portrait of President and First Lady together.

From David Zwirner :

This landmark commission will be on view in the main lobby of the museum at the Obama Presidential Center, which opens in Chicago this coming Friday on Juneteenth.

The portrait weaves together archival imagery, family albums, historical ephemera, and cultural touchstones.
Densely layered and rich with biographical detail, the work honors the Obamas’ legacy while connecting it to the many generations of artists, activists, citizens, and leaders whose collective journeys helped pave their way to the White House.

This first dual portrait of the Obamas depicts them as both public figures and people with layered private lives.
Using her signature photo-transfer technique, Akunyili Crosby incorporates images significant to the couple and those from our shared cultural memory. Rich detail situates the Obamas’ public lives within the personal histories that shaped them: a window frames the scene, its arches echoing the Oval Office, while the view centers Mrs. Obama’s childhood home, her father’s Buick parked out front.

Painting details:
Njideka Akunyili Crosby
The Obamas: Springing Forth, 2026
Photo by Marten Elder

06/16/2026

Godofredo Astudillo .studio featured in our new release, Pacific Coast # 181

The artists in this issue were selected by Bill Powers, owner of ⁠
Tap the link in our bio to get your copy and discover the artists shaping contemporary painting first.
Applications are currently open for our upcoming 2026 Pacific Coast edition! Share your work with our engaged audience of collectors, curators, gallerists, and art-lovers. 📖💙
Hancock Park 1275
oil on linen, 24 x 48 inches
“My work is rooted in memory and recovery. Before my first brain surgery, I wrote my will. I gave away everything—bank accounts, property, books, sweaters that only made sense to me. I called those I loved, and those I had once loved, to make peace. It felt like being visited by the ghosts of past, present, and future all at once—a reckoning, a quiet reconciliation with the life I’d lived, and whatever might remain.

After my second surgery, names and faces blurred further, but feelings stayed sharp. I didn’t feel free of the past:I felt robbed. Painting became resistance—a way to hold onto imagined futures and half-remembered youth. Oil was slow enough to carry what I couldn’t speak aloud. Hesitant, layered, fragile, stubborn.

I paint from sensory fragments: burnt popcorn at the dollar theater, oranges by the freeway, incense and bubble gum in a wooden confessional, the weight of a borrowed jacket, laughter from houses I wasn’t invited into. I paint the places I fear are lost, returning as if repetition could make them stay.“⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

06/16/2026

06/15/2026

06/13/2026

Marcel Alcalá featured in our new release, Pacific Coast # 181

The artists in this issue were selected by Bill Powers, owner of ⁠
Tap the link in our bio to get your copy and discover the artists shaping contemporary painting first.
Applications are currently open for our upcoming 2026 Pacific Coast edition! Share your work with our engaged audience of collectors, curators, gallerists, and art-lovers.
Admiration, a Gift
oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches
“My multimedia practice weaves together Los Angeles landmarks, Spanish art history, and the lived experiences of my Mexican-American heritage and q***r community. Through photography, I document the people who shape my world—capturing intimate moments at Pride festivals, quiet gatherings, and celebrations that become spaces of refuge and connection. My poetry chronicles travels and friendships across Southern California, mapping the emotional geography of belonging.

These modes converge in my painting practice, where the act of creation becomes performance itself. Spiritual ephemera and figures pulse across my canvases in a diaristic approach that transforms personal narrative into visual language. As both an American and Mexican citizen born and raised in California, I navigate the complex legacy of Spanish colonialism—the language that shapes my thoughts, the church that informs my spirituality, and the rituals that mark time. Through this intersection of mediums, I create work that honors both the weight of history and the vitality of present-day q***r Chicano experience in Los Angeles.“⁠
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06/10/2026

We are thrilled to announce the release of Pacific Coast Issue # 181!
Artist Selections by Bill Powers, Owner of Half Gallery ⁠
Tap the link in our bio to get your copy and discover 40 incredible emerging artists on the Pacific Coast 💌⁠

We survey, curate, and introduce the artists shaping contemporary painting. For 33 Years, New American Paintings has introduced exceptional emerging and under-recognized artists to collectors, curators, and art-lovers first.
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A huge thank you to all 40 included artists and to all of the artists who applied and a⁠ heartfelt congratulations to all the incredible artists featured in this issue—welcome to the NAP family.

Cover Artist: Sarah Miska

06/09/2026

06/06/2026

06/02/2026

JESSICA HALONEN featured in our West Issue # 180

The artists in this issue were selected by Rory Padeken , the Vicki and Kent Logan Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Denver Art Museum ⁠
Tap the link in our bio to read the issue and discover 40 emerging and under-recognized artists in the western United States!
Weather (Kanazawa Window 1)
oil on linen, 24 x 18 inches
“Jessica Halonen conducts extensive research for her works, delving into the intersections between art, science, and history. She has engaged with topics that include genetic engineering in the pharmaceutical industry and the historical and metaphorical implications of the color blue. Her new paintings, which fuse abstraction and trompe l’oeil, are informed by a collection of toxic wallpaper samples published by the Michigan State Board of Health in 1874. The book warns of the hazardous particulate matter shed by these decorative papers that were printed with lead- and arsenic-based pigments typical of the time.“⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

05/29/2026

NEXT FRIDAY: join us for the opening reception of Mason Owens 𝘸𝘢𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢 𝘸𝘢𝘳𝘮 𝘥𝘢𝘺

Opening reception:
Friday, June 5, 5:30-8pm

Painting details:
trying on hats in Long Eddy, NY, 2026
egg tempera on linen wrapped panel
8 x 6 inches (20.3 x 15.2 cm)