With unusual psychological and artistic brilliance, Alice Neel (1900-1984) painted the most interesting subject she could imagine: People. Like many great women artists of her time, she was mostly not very successful during her lifetime, and even after her death she was not duly recognised for a long time. Today she is one of the most important artists in America. Neel’s oeuvre is an expression of the deepest humanity. In her paintings, the American captured souls and used socially relevant themes. But why did she paint almost exclusively portraits and what made the genre so appealing? How did the American artist manage to capture people’s souls in her portraits? And what do Neel’s portraits and self-portraits reveal about the time in which she lived and about her own artistic soul? Written / directed by Frauke Schlieckau. A Lona Media production.