Ivan Albright, known for his necrotic art, is not generally considered a realist in the traditional sense. His work, with strong emphasis on surface detail and use of warped perspective and multiple angles of light, has sometimes been called hyper-realistic. It can be linked with 'magic realism', but a rather funereal and macabre kind of 'magic', a vision of haunting psychological intensity imbued with a morbid sense of the corruption of matter and the decay of age.

Born on February 20, 1897, in North Harvey, Illinois, on the outskirts of Chicago, Ivan was the son of Adam Emory and Clara Emilia (Wilson) Albright. His father, a genre painter, was the descendant of a long line of gunsmiths. He named Ivan Le Lorr...