Pearl 2012

Rose Freymuth-Frazier painted this portrait of a young woman in oil paint. The figure emerges from a dark backdrop. This makes me think about the Old Masters, but Freymuth-Frazier gives it a contemporary twist. I see a delicate rendering of skin tones and soft lighting that creates a sense of vulnerability. Maybe Rose was thinking about beauty, and how it can be both alluring and fleeting. I wonder if she was thinking about other women painters like Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, and about the history of portraiture. There’s so much art historical baggage to deal with when you’re making a painting, right? You’re always in conversation with the past, trying to find your own way of seeing. It's like we're all just bouncing ideas off each other across time.