Flying Dreams 2015

Rose Freymuth-Frazier’s "Flying Dreams" captures a woman in goggles and a cap, emerging from darkness with an almost defiant gaze. I can imagine Rose in her studio, coaxing this figure out of the shadows, maybe thinking about the daring of early aviators. There's a dreamy quality, right? The way the landscape is reflected in the goggles—it’s like the painting is showing us her vision, both literally and figuratively. The paint itself is applied with incredible detail, especially in the rendering of skin and fabric, but the background is left dark and undefined. The whole work feels like a study of light and shadow, something that you see a lot in older traditions of painting. It makes me think about the courage and imagination it takes to be an artist, to keep pushing into the unknown and finding new ways to express ourselves. I think of Paula Modersohn-Becker, Alice Neel, and other woman painters. Artists are always riffing off each other.