Artistic expression a lifelong passion for Rector native

Girl in Green Sweater- 1963

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A life-long passion for artistic expression led to a retrospective exhibit earlier this year on the artwork of Rector native Paul Wiley Frets.

Frets was born July 1, 1935, in Rector, the son of Paul William Frets and Marie Wiley Frets.

The family moved to Detroit, Mich., when Frets was a toddler.

He develop an interest in art at a young age. "Probably around 8 or so," Frets said. "It's when I started painting. My grandmother, Grace Wiley, game me my first set of oil paints and that started me on my art career."

He sites Mrs. Kaplan, his elementary school teacher in Detroit, as another important influence. Frets said Mrs. Kaplan was responsible for getting him a scholarship into an art program.

That program was the City Art Program for the Gifted.

When he was 14, the family returned to Rector. Frets said the school had no real art program at that time, so he continued painting on his own throughout his high school years.

After graduating from Rector High School in 1953, he enrolled at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro with a major in art.

"When I started school at Arkansas State in Jonesboro, I had a teacher named Ned Grinner in Art," Frets said. "I also played college baseball down there. J.A. "Ike" Tomlinson, the athletic director and baseball coach from 1944 to 1976, was a strong mentor on behavior...teaching us how to get along with people and life lessons. He was a pretty important person to me."

In 1957 Frets signed a minor league baseball contract. It was the same year that he married Jerry Beverly Glaub on July 8. Later that same month he was drafted into the Army.

After a severe knee injury, Frets was given an honorable discharge and re-entered ASU in 1958 to continue his studies.

In 1958 he began teaching at Rector Elementary School. When he completed his Bachelor of Science in Education degree in 1960, he taught art at Kennett High School.

Frets said when he went through college and into graduate school, he had three important mentors.

The first was a teacher, John Weller, at the University of Missouri at Columbia. Frets obtained his Master of Arts degree from that school in 1964. After obtaining his master's degree, he was hired as an Assistant Professor of Art at Radford University in Radford, Va.

The other two mentors, Gandy Brodie, and Elaine de Kooning, were prominent artists from New York that he met while pursuing his doctoral degree at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

He worked on his doctoral degree during a sabbatical from Radford University.

Frets was attending Carnegie Mellon after being awarded the Andrew Mellon Fellowship. During the course of his studies, he worked as an assistant to Brodie and de Kooning. He also continued his work as a teacher, teaching drawing to high school students in the Carnegie Museum Art Program.

Frets acquired his Doctor of Arts degree in 1971. He returned to work at Radford University, where he was promoted to Full Professor of Art. He also established his own studio in downtown Radford.

In 1986, Frets took a second sabbatical from Radford University and began work on his "Energy Motion and Color' series. He exhibited his works at the Art Museum of Western Virginia and regional galleries during this time.

He also visited de Kooning and assisted her in East Hampton, N.Y. In the winter of 1987 he served as curator for a showing of de Kooning's works in Radford.

After her death in 1989, Frets stopped painting temporarily. When he resumed his work, he started "The Silent Earth" series in her memory. The paintings included Virginia soil suspended in the acrylic paints used in the works.

After 32 years as a professor, Frets retired from Radford University in 1996 as Professor Emeritus.

Frets said his early works were done in pencils, crayons and oil paints."Some of the earliest things I painted included a religious scene. The earliest may have been a deer on a mountain looking over a vista," he said. When he entered college, he began painting portraits and people.

"Now I paint mostly large abstract paintings," he said. "Abstraction allows me the most adventure and offers the most possibilities."

The Radford University retrospective, held Jan. 15-Feb 8, 2004, included paintings, prints, drawing and sculpture. Although paint is the medium for which most people know him, Frets has made excursions into working in several different mediums; however, the lure of a canvas and paint has always brought him back.

"Painting is my primary medium. I taught drawing, painting and printmaking at the university. I was never too interested in sculpture. I enjoyed it as a diversion" he said.

Frets likened his forays into other formats to vacations. "Something entirely different," he said.

Inspiration can be found by coincidence, according to Frets.

"I tend to be drawn to certain people. I want to paint them. It's a matter of coincidence -- finding someone who has a lot of character," he said. "Sometimes it's the same with landscapes. One may just ring a bell with you."

It was during the discussion of inspiration and it source that Frets mentioned a well-known portion of his work. In 1983, he presented a series of abstract paintings entitled "Gandy Trees" as a eulogy to Brodie. The series was exhibited in regional museums and galleries.

Frets said he chose the abstraction of a tree due to symbolism. "A tree is a symbol of regeneration, life, growth," he said. He continued by explaining how children play in trees and, when they grow up, build houses out of them, but said he especially chose the tree due to the regenerative process and the cycle going around, such as with the change of the seasons when trees lose their leaves and then become green again in the spring.

When one looks at Frets' list of his favorite artists, it might appear that his artistic diversity over the years is a relection of what he loves.

"Early on it was Rembrandt, then Van Gogh and a little later on Cezanne. From Cezanne I became interested in and saw connections to the cubist painters, including Picasso and on up to Piet Mondrain. Then finally, of couorse, Elaine de Kooning and Gandy Brodie were two major influences for me," he said.

Although he's been far from Rector for several years, the city still holds a special place in his heart.

"I've lived in Virginia for 40 some-odd years now, and I still consider Rector my home. I have the warmest feelings for Rector -- memories of growing up there, going to school there and playing basketball and baseball there," he said. "Jerry and I have had close friends and family, I just have tremendously warm feelings for Rector."