Three Nurses 2011

Rose Freymuth-Frazier's painting "Three Nurses" emerges from layers of oil paint, capturing a scene that is both intimate and theatrical. The artist has captured the figures with great detail, but the setting is a dark and empty place. I think about the artist working on this, building up the forms with thin glazes of color. The poses and glances create a narrative, which is both alluring and somehow sinister. The figures have a strange sense of isolation despite being grouped together in a triangle. Think about the history of painting, and all those artists exploring light and shadow, like Caravaggio. Maybe Freymuth-Frazier is in dialogue with those historical paintings. The use of oil allows her to achieve a luminous quality, making the figures seem almost to glow against the dark background. Ultimately, this painting is a testament to the enduring power of paint to evoke complex emotions.