Harold Frank (American born in England, 1921-1995). "Strange Head" oil paint on wood panel, n.d. Signed at lower right. A beautiful painting by Harold Frank depicting a bust-length abstract portrait of a female rendered with loose brushstrokes, lyrical lines, and a brilliant color palette. The woman's ovoid visage presents with a Fauvist-inspired half-white, half-green complexion as well as red and black highlights to contour the eyes, nose, and lips. A centrally-parted coiffure frames the face in a virtual rainbow of red, orange, sky blue, lavender, buttercup yellow, and royal blue. Her model-like features - almond-shaped eyes, arched brows, bow lips, and an aquiline nose - are intriguingly distorted through Frank's modernist lens. According to scholar Sandie Stern, "Like his idol de Kooning, Frank chose the human figure, as his principal subject. Variations on women became a lifelong, consistent, ubiquitous theme." (Stern, "H. Frank", p. 16) Size: 16" L x 13.875" W (40.6 cm x 35.2 cm)

Harold Frank immigrated with his family to the US through Ellis Island. Growing up in the tenements of the Lower East Side in New York City during the era of the Great Depression and World War II, Frank found Abstract Expressionism to be the ideal means to explore the angst of his world. He once stated, "I can live with the abstract. Life is a mystery."

Frank studied at the Art Students League in New York, the National Academy of Design, the Pratt Institute, the Chouinard Art Institute, and UCLA where he was a colleague of Richard Diebenkorn (American, 1922-1993), an artist who is oftentimes associated with Abstract Expressionism as well as a pioneer of the Bay Area Figurative Movement. In addition to Diebenkorn, Frank's influences include De Kooning, Picasso, Matisse, and Rouault. While he also created landscapes, non-objective abstract compositions, and still-life paintings, figures and head studies were the predominant theme of his oeuvre.

For more about Harold Frank, see Sandie Stern's monograph "Harold Frank Abstract Expressionist 1921-1995" (2001).

Provenance: private Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA collection, acquired via descent, purchased from artist on June 25th, 1973

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#175896

Signed by the artist on the lower right. Some fissures, scuffs, and a few small losses to the peripheries as shown. Paint splatters and collection labels on verso.