Christopher Stackhouse considers Leland Bell's painting Family Group with Butterfly (1986–1990).

Stackhouse writes: "When a painting provides an immersive experience it is immediately recognized as a successful effort… What makes the better of Leland Bell’s paintings captivating is their practicality and immediacy as they distribute seductive nuance in content and form. Bell’s painted imagery is rather matter-of-fact in its complexity… The plain-spokenness that he brings to service a modest, sincere, art belies a vaster address to the human condition. The painting is not interested in flamboyance. It is not interested in changing the world as much as creating one in which its language can survive."