Abstractions in Color
Ahead of his exhibition at the Frederick Harris Gallery this month, acclaimed American Japanese painter Shingo Francis talks color, catharsis and the emotional power of art.
There’s something deceptive about the art of Shingo Francis. His abstract paintings often exude a minimalism that emphasizes light, shapes and borders.
At other times, they’re a riot of colors and lines, locked in violent struggle or shimmering like sunlight on water. Both have the power to arrest and captivate.
The award-winning painter, who divides his time between the ancient coastal town of Kamakura and Los Angeles, has exhibited his works across the world, and his paintings hang in such eminent institutions as the Frederick R Weisman Art Foundation in LA.
While two stunning pieces from his “Bands Light Space” series adorn the walls of the Nihonbashi Club’s 1673 meeting venue, Francis will unveil his first-ever exhibition at the Frederick Harris Gallery this month.
Image: “Union” by Shingo Francis
The artist’s work is shaped by his artistic pedigree and unique upbringing. Born in Santa Monica, California in 1969, Francis’ father, Sam Francis, was a painter and printmaker who was influenced by abstract expressionism, color field painting, East Asian art and Zen Buddhism. The American, whose centenary was marked this year by a retrospective at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, had a lifelong fascination with Japan. His fourth marriage, to Japanese media artist Mako Idemitsu, produced two boys, Shingo and Osamu.
At age 3, Francis moved to Japan to live with Idemitsu. He was a Member of the Club in the 1970s, when he attended Nishimachi International School, and has memories of bowling, movies and french fries. Later, he would travel between his mother in Japan and his father in California.
“When Osamu and I were younger, we had a little corner in my father’s studio to paint,” Francis says. “With my mother also being an artist, there were a lot of artists and art in the house, both in LA and Japan. My father had many assistants who were like an extended family for us. So my paradigm growing up was: people make things. This environment was a big education for me.”
Image (Nacása & Partners): Shingo Francis’ works hanging in the Nihonbashi Club’s 1673 venue
Francis’ first ambition was to be a writer. He even attended journalism school. But he found it too structured. Armed with some of his father’s paints and brushes, he pursued art as an elective and never looked back.
His fascination with storytelling filled his early pieces, with their narrative and landscape elements. A turning point came during a trip to Paris, where he met American expressionist painter and family friend Joan Mitchell. Francis showed her some interiors and copies of Renaissance masters.
“You can paint, but you’re just illustrating,” she told him. “It’s just empty. If you really want to paint, you’re going to have to reach deep inside and pull it out.”
Francis set about creating his own visual language. He drew inspiration from the abstract painters Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and Helen Frankenthaler, as well as geometric abstractionist artists like Josef Albers. He was intrigued by monochromatic surfaces, depictions of color as space and, like his father, Zen articulations of emptiness. He also developed an interest in Jungian psychology, symbolism and dream imagery.
“It’s hard to create something completely new. A lot of times, it’s reconfiguration,” Francis says. “A line is a line. A color field is a color field. Nobody’s inventing that again. But you’re using it in your own way.”
Image (Kayo Yamawaki): Shingo Francis in his Kamakura studio
The results can be dramatic. Francis says some people who view his paintings—characterized by a dominant color, sometimes with a single line along the top or bottom—are overwhelmed. Others feel blissful. One woman, he says, experienced a powerful childhood flashback and broke down in tears.
Other works by Francis can be mesmerizing. His “Interference” series—a nod to California’s Light and Space movement in the 1960s—features interference pigments that incorporate titanium-coated mica to refract light in different colors, like a butterfly’s wing, depending on the viewing angle.
His “Illumination in Violet” (2022), for instance, presents an iridescent circle in a square of graduated color. It’s an exploration of color and shape that is open to interpretation. Just as the artist intends with all his work.
“I want viewers to have an experience,” Francis says. “But I want to evoke something inside of them. Or at least slow them down and have them stop and look and see what the colors and composition are doing. Artwork is transformative, so if it can release some kind of energy that has been stored in them somewhere, it can be a cathartic experience. I think we all need that in some way, from all kinds of art. It’s a release.”
Exhibition: Shingo Francis
November 1–December 4 (opening reception: November 2)
Words: Tim Hornyak
Top image of Shingo Francis: Kayo Yamawaki
November 2023
