Photograph by Paul Myers

Muralist and painter Barbara Frese painted this colorful scene of Lake Tahoe on the guesthouse belonging to Maxine McGinnis.




Artist does what comes naturally

By Shari Kaplan

For years, Los Gatos artist Barbara Frese has been doing what comes naturally. For her, that means painting, especially scenes from the outdoors--which is about as natural as it gets.

Frese says she never really thought a lot about her ability to transform a blank outdoor or indoor wall into a relaxing retreat, but her family, friends and clients do. One who is both friend and client is Saratogan Maxine McGinnis.

McGinnis is a fellow artist who joins Frese and a handful of other creative types each week to paint at the Saratoga Senior Center. She also has a guesthouse on her wooded Oak Place property with a dull wall facing a patio area she calls her "outdoor living room."

Armed with the knowledge that McGinnis loves flowers and the Lake Tahoe area, Frese incorporated both images into an idyllic, but uncontrived, mural of trees, colorful blooms, water, boats and sky. She later added finishing touches like pine cones on the evergreens and clouds in the blue sky.

"Barbara paints like crazy! She's a doer. She doesn't talk about it; she just does it. She visualizes what she wants and she does it!" McGinnis says.

That's pretty much how it's always been for Frese, who was part of a large family. "I grew up like a weed. Because I was self-sufficient, I grew up without cultivation," she says in reference to the artistic skills she cultivated in herself early on.

In kindergarten, Frese remembers her teacher telling her parents that she had a lot of talent. A few years later, one of her elementary school teachers was so impressed with an oilcloth tablecloth Frese designed that the teacher requested two more for herself, even offering to pay her young student. Frese was glad to oblige, but not because of the money.

By age 8, Frese was already keeping a portfolio; by junior high school, she was entering art contests. When she married and became a mother, she kept busy painting the house, the cabinets and her children's furniture. She also studied art with various teachers, one time even having her work mistaken for that of the instructor.

"I never thought I was anything, and I still don't. I don't go out of my way to sell [art] or promote it; I just do it," Frese says, smiling.

She planned to make a living with portrait coloring--painting on enlarged photographs, which gives them the appearance of portraits. She wasn't satisfied with it, however, as it didn't let her create anything new.

She didn't worry about that once the 1970s rolled around, because she and her husband bought an 89-foot English ketch sailboat and lived in the West Indies for much of that decade. They later spent four years traveling around the United States in a poptop van--until her husband's untimely death while on the road.

Frese credits her daughter Beverly Mannon of Los Gatos with helping her through this difficult time, as well as helping her get on her current path of professional artistry. Mannon, who works for a real state firm, arranged for Frese to draw artistic renderings for co-workers real estate listings. She also sent thank you cards to clients with prints of her mother's artwork.

A couple to whom Mannon sold a home in La Selva Beach liked the art so much that they commissioned Frese to paint a small mural for their bathroom. "We don't realize how capable we are of something until someone asks us!" Frese recalls of that once-daunting experience.

It's been smooth sailing since, with Frese painting not only on walls like McGinnis' and Mannon's clients', but on other things as well, including matchstick bamboo blinds. She's even been known to downsize her artistic eye and work on canvas, as she did recently when her Welsh landlady asked her to paint Villa Montalvo for the Festival of Wales, a musical event coming Aug. 29 to the Saratoga cultural center.

"My husband used to say that if you complain you're bored, it's a sign of mental deficiency," Frese says, chuckling. And with a career blooming as much as the flowers she likes to paint, Frese is certainly far from bored.

---

Barbara Frese can be contacted at 408.445.8846.

---

Photo: Unwanted Delivery

Home buyers finding more for less

Wedding: James and Kimberly Albright

Saratoga Sampler

Sports Briefs

Los Gatos Dammit Run

2001 Stead Open Tennis Tournament