Pulitzer Winner Hilton Als to Stop by STATE OF THE ARTS NYC This Friday

On Friday April 14th, Hilton Als, writer, photographer, curator and now Pulitzer Prize-winning theatre critic, will talk with host/producer Savona Bailey-McClain at 5 p.m. on WBAI FM Radio.

The two will discuss his exhibition Alice Neel, Uptown that's showing at the David Zwirner Gallery located on 19th Street in Chelsea.

A frequent speaker and moderator on the NY's lecture circuit, Als is known for his in-depth understanding and appreciation in theater, dance, music and the visual arts. According to Als,

"From the start Alice Neel's artistry made life different for me, or not so much different as more enlightened. I grew up in Brooklyn, East New York, and Crown Heights during the 1970s when Neel, after years of obscurity, was finally getting her due. I recall first seeing her work in a book, and what shocked me more than her outrageous and accurate sense of color and form-did we really look like that? We did! - was the realization that her subject was my humanity. There was a quality I shared with her subjects, all of whom were seen through the lens of Neel's interest, and compassion. What did it matter that I grew up in a world that was different than that which Linda Nochlin, and Andy Warhol, and Jackie Curtis, inhabited? We were all as strong and fragile and present as life allowed. And Neel saw."

Al's Pulitzer Prize Award win yesterday for criticism marks the first time a theatre critic has won since 1978.

Savona Bailey-McClain, known on the air as the Host/Producer for the radio show State of the Arts NYC, which can be heard on Friday nights on WBAI FM Radio, live-streamed on Tunein.com and later heard on iTunes. Bailey-McClain is a public art curator and conducts tours to art dealers and galleries in Chelsea, LES, Upper East Side, DUMBO and Williamsburg.