Joke Frima

Joke Frima (1952) is a Dutch painter. She currently resides in France but lived in Italy for eight  years, where she studied painting with  Signorina Nerina Simi. During this period Frima also taught  skill based  drawing and  painting and developed her personal style based on a careful and direct study of nature .

Her ability to capture the beauty and serenity of nature is mimesis par excellence. Her work is an ode to nature, particularly the plant world, which she carefully observes and analyses. Flora, the title given to both this book and the exhibition, is therefore apt.

In the early days, botany – the study of flora – was more art than science, and Frima applies her own artistry to analyse nature and capture it on canvas. She does so after careful observations from life, which lead to paintings in which greens dominate, and subtle value and colour gradations are punctuated by strong colour accents to ensure both thematic (pumpkins, water lilies) and visual concentration on the main subject. 

In her graphite and charcoal drawings people are used as models for study purposes. There are few human figures in her oeuvre, except for self­ portraits or paintings of family members or close friends.