Woman Seated in a Garden

Frederick Frieseke depicted women relaxing outdoors throughout his career. He believed that by painting the same subject again and again he could better concentrate on capturing the true effects of color and light. Influenced by the French Impressionists, who favored a bright palette, Frieseke painted the shadows on the terrace and the tall tree in the background using blues and lavenders, rather than shades of gray or black. Frieseke's use of intense, almost arbitrary colors shows his affinity with the Post-Impressionists Paul Gauguin and Pierre Bonnard.