The Artwork of Angela Fraleigh

Angela Fraleigh's work is dreamy, emotional, and provocative to say the least. We all can take what we want from these images, as they might mean different things to different people. For myself, I get a big hit of seduction and sensuality from many of her pieces, so I tend to think they would look great in the bedroom...To each our own...

The quietest sounds on earth, 8 x 16 ft. oil on canvas

Angela Fraleigh "even", 2007 oil on panel, 72 x 96 inches

The above are photos from her show at The Inman Gallery in Houston, Texas.

Angela Fraleigh "the story she told from that time on", 2007 oil on panel, 72 x 96 inches

Angela Fraleigh "but that would come later", 2007 oil on panel, 24 x 32 inches

Angela Fraleigh "as it was then", 2007 oil on panel, 24 x 32 inches

Artist Statement

My Mother was just eighteen when I was born but she had been living on her own with David for three years. Orphaning herself at an early age was a means of survival. She dropped out of high school in 73’, received her GED and began working at Beaufort Community College as a secretary at night taking classes during the day.

Shirley Wallace baby-sat.

My parents Debbie and David grew pot in the backyard but had to start hiding the plants behind the kiddy pool because Shirley’s husband Joe was a narc.

We lived on Humphrey’s road in a trailer next door to David’s bosses house. He was in construction which was good work when it was steady. That place was a “dump" so they left and rented a house on Rogers road. When I was one year old David moved out and my mother moved to a “nice” three bedroom trailer with her friend Susan.

My mother said it was probably her aunt Anna who inspired her to put her past behind her and change her life. Anna always smelled nice, had respect for others, she liked better things and kept a clean house...that and TV.

Even when she and my father were out of work we always looked respectable. Nice manners, combed hair, clean clothes. Nobody knew. My mother has always been into appearances.

It was a godsend television, through it she could see how other people lived- how it was supposed to be.

She met Lee in 1978 at a disco. Three weeks later he proposed.

Questioning social constructs of beauty, class, gender and role play I am interested in the complications of desire, what power people have available to them and how they use that power. These images serve as a means of escape from one’s personal histories but also provides a space to question these idealistic scenarios. Drawing on dramatic moments from literature and framing the romantic stereotypes that are created these images are complicated by obscured power structures. Ambiguity conceals where authority lies in these familiar images disrupting our understanding of these hackneyed relationships while bringing into the foreground the continual power struggles still fueling our political, social and intimate relationships.

These tensions are heightened as paint itself becomes a tool for the disturbance; a main protagonist in the story and a carrier of meaning. Violent and seductive, threatening and unpredictable it complicates the image leaving us unsure if the figures are being birthed or eaten away; if the paint is taking control, acting as savior, interrupting, manipulating or providing the stimulus for the relationship. Physicality of the paint both cankers and covers the narrative caressing the fine line between victim and volunteer. There is a desperate human quality in the work, one that embraces the flawed hero.... you know what was supposed to have happened but you also know it didn't.