Sherron Francis American, b. 1940

Sherron Francis (b. 1940, Chicago, Illinois) is an American artist associated with the second generation of Color Field painting and post-Abstract Expressionism. Her work is distinguished by luminous, atmospheric surfaces and a restrained palette modulated with exceptional subtlety, creating works that evoke an ethereal presence and a deep sense of spirituality.
 
Francis studied interior design at the University of Oklahoma before earning her BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute in 1963, where she studied alongside Dan Christensen and Ronnie Landfield. She later received her MFA from Indiana University and took on a teaching position at Eastern Michigan University. In 1968, she relocated to New York, settling in SoHo at a pivotal moment in the development of contemporary painting. There, she became associated with a tight-knit community of artists including Dan Christensen, her close friend from the Midwest, and also Larry Zox, Walter Darby Bannard, and Larry Poons. In 1969, Francis was a founding member of the Bowery Gallery, where she held her first solo exhibition in 1970. Initially working in a figurative mode painting male nudes, she soon turned to abstraction, aligning herself with a generation of painters who moved away from the hard-edged geometry of the previous decade toward a more lyrical and material expressive approach. 
 
Her introduction to André Emmerich Gallery by Dan Christensen marked a turning point in her career, as Emmerich was the leading gallerist for Abstract Expressionism and Color-Field painting and had presented solo exhibitions for Hans Hofmann, David Hockney, Morris Louis, Helen Frankenthaler, and Kenneth Noland. In 1973, she showed in a solo exhibition that established her critical reputation, followed by inclusion in the 1973 Whitney Biennial. In response to her work, Peter Schjeldahl wrote for the New York Times: “Francis has…sidestepped the danger of seeming hopelessly derivative of such artists as Mark Rothko, Morris Louis and Helen Frankenthaler —by, it seems to me, the use of a single canny formal device. All her canvases are tall, vertical rectangles. What this shape achieves is a physical presence that supports the paintings' fragile play of color and texture. Bearing roughly the proportions of the human body, but bigger in size, her pictures confront the viewer with a satisfying firmness, inviting delectation.” Her work from this period is characterized by stained and brushed surfaces that produce softly grained textures, within which amorphous zones of color emerge and dissolve. Using a muted palette of pinks, blue-greens, and warm, golden browns, Francis developed a highly nuanced approach to color.
 
Francis received a total of six solo exhibitions in the 1970s, two of which were held at André Emmerich Gallery in 1973 and 1974, with later showings at Tibor de Nagy in 1978 and again in 1980. She also exhibited widely in group exhibitions throughout the 1970s and early 1980s in New York, as well as venues in Houston, Baltimore, Kansas City, and Detroit. Her work was collected by prominent figures such as Clement Greenberg and Helen Frankenthaler, underscoring her proximity to key critical and artistic circles of the period. In the late 1970s and 1980s, Francis expanded her material practice, experimenting with acrylic and gel mediums that allowed for greater physicality in her work. Her paintings became increasingly gestural and tactile, incorporating thick impasto and mixtures of pigment and gravel. By 1980, she had also begun creating clay works, which she exhibited alongside artists such as Kikuo Saito and Betty Woodman. 
 
Francis also maintained a dedicated teaching career, holding positions at the Ridgewood School of Art and Design from 1972 to 1985 and Cooper Union from 1978 to 1985, where she influenced a generation of younger artists. By the mid-1980s, shifting conditions in downtown New York led Francis to permanently relocate to the North Fork, marking a gradual withdrawal from the New York art world. Francis’s work is now held in many private and public collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the Art Gallery of Alberta, the Everson Museum, the Museum of Southern Texas, the Power Gallery of Contemporary Art in Australia, and the Portland Art Museum.