Woman with Chicken by Missy Weems. Oil on masonite, 15¾" x 20". Collection of Thackray Seznec.
Her son recalls Coale’s persistent focus on the positive in the artists’ work during Pepsi-Cola factory critiques. “He would keep emphasizing what they got right, so that soon, since [the canvas] is a limited space, there wouldn’t be
60 | Fall 2019
room for anything wrong.” Ochs has the most subtle palette of the four artists, often working in pastel tones, grays, and blacks. In her oil paintings, she shows a sparing touch, seemingly letting areas of canvas remain unpainted.
In Bridge at Eastport, brush marks are left raw and sparse, roughing out the shape of a bridge in this panoramically formatted painting. Eventually she began experimenting with cut or torn pieces of canvas, collaged onto other canvases and painted in grays and blacks. Many of these compositions have consistently leveled rectangles placed in graphically pleasing proportions, painted with colors that differ subtly from each other. In Imperfection, however, a large white rectangle sits askew from the rest of the composition, creating a sense of tension not found in some of her other collage pieces. Other compositions introduce curiously precise circular shapes. In Chanticleer, the fabled rooster is depicted by a series of circles and circle fragments. The body is perfectly round, the tail an upsweep of pointed crescents. Composition 92, horizontal with a single, carefully constructed circle, confined into and visually superimposed within surrounding rectilinear pieces, exudes a sense of curiosity. Its rough-edged rectangles lend a sculptural feel, the paint thick and tar-like. The arrangement creates a space in which to wander, reminiscent of Louise Nevelson’s iconic monochrome wall-mounted sculptures, and seems to represent a journey from tentative to bold. Gertrude St. Michel Freinek, also known as Michel Freinek, signed her paintings “M i c h e l.” Born in Trier, Germany, she spent her teen years in New York City, but after the death of her father, returned home. She studied color theory and color chemistry at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, Austria. Her marriage to Dr. Wilfried R.