Alison van Pelt

Van Pelt was born and raised in California and grew up in Los Angeles, where she attended the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). She came of age in the 1970s and her distinctive photorealist painting style is evocative of that era. In 1992, Van Pelt traveled to Florence, Italy to study painting at the Florence Academy of Art, where the ethereal style of her work prompted comparisons to the Shroud of Turin. During the two years she spent studying abroad, she showed her work in solo exhibitions overseas: Galerie Paul Sties in Krönberg, Germany, New Paintings at Galerie Lauter in Mannheim, Germany, and at Galerie Vedovi in Brussels.

Van Pelt’s portrait of William S. Burroughs welcomes visitors to Ports of Entry, an exhibit of Burroughs’ work held at Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1996.