Frances Paley

“I’m so pleased to debut this work right here in Rochester at the new Spectrum Gallery space,” says Paley, a Long Island native who moved to Rochester in 1975 after marrying sculptor Albert Paley.  She and her now-world-renowned husband have been fans of Spectrum Gallery for most of its 40+ years.

Throughout the 1980’s, Frances Paley, who holds both a Master of Fine Arts from RIT as well as a Masters in Psychotherapy from Goddard College, specialized in large-scale, airbrushed water colors and pen and ink drawings.  She rediscovered her love of black and white photography in the mid-90’s, when she began utilizing the computer to transform her images.
 
“I would like viewers to know that each photographic image is exactly as taken,” explains Paley. “It is not layered. It is not a montage. I neither set up the vignettes nor move objects to create them. I photograph exactly what exists at a particular moment in time. The sole alteration is color. This allows me to enrich and deepen the emotional impact of the images.”
 
Paley’s stunning images focus on figures, architecture, animals, fashion and oddities that embody the romantic, the mysterious and the surreal.