Frances Thomas: The Broader Picture

Exhibition: May 23 – June 22, 2019
Reception: Thursday, May 23, 7:00 – 9:00 pm
Artist Talk: Saturday, May 25, 3:00 pm

Peter Robertson Gallery
12323 – 104 Ave. NW, Edmonton, Alberta

Gallery Hours:
Tuesday – Friday 11:00 am – 5:00 pm
Saturday 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Images (left): Just Floating, 2018, 76×76 cm, acrylic on canvas. (right): It’s Time, 2016, 61×61 cm, acrylic on canvas

For me painting is a way of thinking. I have always just followed the work. Even if something is completely different from what I have made before, I know it’s right—it either works or it doesn’t as an artwork. I am interested more in what is happening in the moment, with the materials and my instincts, and less with rigorous conceptual strategies. My hope is that the viewers who come face to face with the work can follow their own pathways through the internal logic of each piece and find something to hang on to and enjoy.
– Frances Thomas

We are delighted to present once again the work of Frances Thomas in her current exhibition, The Broader Picture. Drawing on a range of earlier works including her Berlin series which are being placed in juxtaposition with more recent paintings, we find unexpected relationships and a deepening of the experience of the artwork. Revelatory insights allow for an appreciation of the choices the artist has made along the way in the development of her visual language. Based on what Thomas would call “an advanced way to represent reality” she believes that everything seen and experienced gets translated into her paintings, a visual response stripped down into poetic movement, colour, line and shape. Deeply connected to the geography of her youth, environmental phenomenon and the mystical apprehension of knowledge, we can see hints of these forces at work within her gestures. Thomas’ artwork can be characterised as compelling energy and an unceasing commitment to experimentation that results in a rewarding richness and diversity.

About the Artist
Frances Thomas was born in Parry Sound, Ontario and is a Barrie, ON based artist. She holds both a BFA and MFA from York University and is the recipient of the Samuel Sarick Purchase Award for excellence in thesis work. Thomas has participated in artist residencies in Canada and the US and in 2016 completed a three-month self-directed residency in Berlin, Germany. Her paintings were featured in a solo exhibition, “but wait”, with an accompanying catalogue, at the MacLaren Art Centre in 2009/10. She has exhibited in Edmonton, Barrie, Toronto and New York and her work is in the permanent collections of the MacLaren Art Centre, Bank of Montreal (BMO) and York University.

For further details, please contact:

Peter Robertson Gallery
12323 – 104 Ave. NW Edmonton, Alberta T5N 0V4
Phone (780) 455 7479
Email: info@probertsongallery.com
Website: https://www.probertsongallery.com

Peter Robertson Gallery is an accessible space.