Rose Frantzen

Rose Franzten crafts beautiful oil paintings from life using the traditional alla prima method (keeping the oil paint wet as successive layers are painted) which has been employed by artists for centuries. Her portraits, landscapes, and still lifes are modern representations of life with allegorical elements and often incorporate surrealist settings created in this traditional painting style. There is great vibrancy in her art and the lifelike imagery pulls the viewer into the scene, to wonder who this person is or what foreign world Frantzen is depicting. Frantzen was born, raised, and returned to Maquoketa, Iowa, and the rural lifestyle and landscape continue to provide inspiration for her paintings. She attended the American Academy of Art in Chicago, the Palette & Chisel Academy in Chicago, and the Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts in Old Lyme, Connecticut. After extensive traveling, she returned to Maquoketa, Iowa and purchased the old city hall with her parents, renovating the building and creating a large gallery with extensive studio space. Frantzen’s Portrait of Maquoketa began as a project to document the people of her hometown and developed into 180 portraits that were then exhibited at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery. Frantzen has been leading workshops throughout the country in the past several years teaching her use of the alla prima method and has also guest lectured at numerous museums and art conferences. Rose Frantzen’s lifelike and radiant examinations of humans and our world bring together a long tradition of oil painting and portraiture with the skill and forward thinking of a 21st century artist.