We The People

CHAWKY FRENN PAINTS IT AS HE SEES IT

by Cole Tracy

Chawky Frenn is a great activist in many realms. He is dedicated to teaching new artists at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia; produces books on the fine arts of the underappreciated city of Boston, with which he has close ties; and is an active figurative painter whose work focuses on bold topics such as the human condition and governmental issues.

“If realism is painting reality, then I am a realist/humanist painter. I am painting the reality I perceive in front of me,” Frenn said. “I examine social and political issues that are, for me, at the heart of any humanist endeavor. The struggles between the ruling political and financial class, the elite and the ruled classes transcend civilizations, cultures, religions, regions and times.”

His newest show, “We the People” (which was exhibited at Pine Manor College’s Hess Gallery last fall), is on view this spring at Milton Academy’s Nesto Gallery. It seems his work is always a mixture of acknowledging the human condition and rendering these issues with coinciding beauty, produced not out of a desire to render but out of meditations upon our troubling existence.

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