Philip Frey

About the Artist

“As a painter, Philip Frey’s goal is often a project of soft persuasion. We recognize his scenes easily enough. But as we shift our focus from the recognizable subject to the insistent forms, luscious brushwork, and compositional design, the painting slips out of representational focus and back to abstraction, the true place of Frey’s poetry.”

— Daniel Kany, Philip Frey: Here and Now, by Daniel Kany and Carl Little

BIOGRAPHY
Philip Frey was born in Portland, Maine in 1967, graduated with a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts in Painting from Syracuse University in 1990, and has studied with master Maine artist, Alan Bray. He maintains a full-time studio practice nestled in the woods along the coast of downeast Maine and teaches select painting workshops each year. Frey’s primary focus is the color, light, and forms of the landscape as well as the figure and interiors. He paints from direct perception, preferring the dynamic quality, richness, and challenges of working from life. Frey is represented by Courthouse Gallery Fine Art, Edgewater Gallery, and Carver Hill Gallery.

Frey is a nationally exhibiting artist, with a long and steady show history in acclaimed galleries. The University of Maine Museum of Art mounted a solo exhibition of his work in 2016. The monograph, Philip Frey: Here and Now, by Daniel Kany and Carl Little will be released in 2018. His work has been featured in several publications, including: Art New England, Art of Acadia, Gettysburg Review, Maine Policy Review, and the Maine Sunday Telegram. Currently, Frey’s work is held internationally in prominent private and corporate collections, including that of writer Harlan Coben, Rep. Chellie Pingree & Donald Sussman, Dick Wolf Films and the University of Maine Museum of Art. In 2018, Frey will have two solo exhibitions, one at Courthouse Gallery Fine Art (Ellsworth, ME) and the other at Edgewater Gallery (Middlebury, VT).

George Kinghorn, writes, “Here and Now offers readers, collectors, and art aficionados a selection of recent work by Philip Frey, one of Maine’s most accomplished painters. Frey, who began his career as an artist over twenty years ago, explains that his work addresses “a need to explore, discover, and stretch” his limits as a painter, and that by design, his explorations in one series influence the other, and vice versa. This constant search for new sources of inspiration is integral to his process.”