Frances Hynes: Playing Notes
41.3 x 50.8 cm
Paper + Paint
Taking a Walk: Steps and Notes
My first painting was a watercolor which I still have, a view of my neighborhood: Cape Cod homes, fences, windows, trees, the land and sky. The same subjects, pared down and abstracted, appear in paintings in this exhibition.
My first show in 1972 at an artists’ cooperative gallery on Union Square in New York City is documented with a simple announcement, copy only, a list of words: house, window, lake, mountain, island, green-sea, blue-rain, ground, air, wind, river. These elements too, remain present in my work.
A 1992 painting in this show depicts a runner. My lofty goal as a young artist was to draw the figure like a Renaissance Master, so I spent a year studying at the Scuola del Nudo, Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, Italy and subsequently at the Art Students League in Woodstock, NY. I also practiced drawing for hundreds of hours at various life drawing sessions that were conducted evenings and Saturdays in Manhattan: Project of Living Artists in Soho and Eve Fisk Studio are two that I recall. Eventually, I grew to favor quick, gestural drawing with brush or pen.
Finally, experimentation with the materials inform my painting: paper and paint, and curiosity about how initial ideas change, as marks, shapes and lines, are brushed onto a surface, their new look suggesting the next step in the painting, and its destination.
Frances Hynes
April 2025
