March 20, 2019 (Decatur, Georgia) -- DIFFERENT TRAINS GALLERY, 432 East Howard Avenue no. 24, presents Only When I Laugh, a show of drawings and paintings by England-born/Georgia-based artist Ruth Franklin. The exhibition opens to the public with a reception for the artist on Friday, April 12, from 5-9 p.m. and the show continues through June 22.
This is the first solo exhibition for this respected local artist in more than a decade. Franklin has kept a studio in Decatur since emigrating from England in 1994, during which she's worked full-time as an artist and exhibited internationally, from Nashville to New York to the Netherlands. Her Atlanta debut exhibition was in 1998 at the Vinson Gallery on Decatur Square, making this a kind of homecoming with Shawn Vinson now a partner and director of Different Trains.
Fans of Franklin's figurative expressionism will enjoy a mini-retrospective of sorts. The exhibit will include her soulful paintings, evocative charcoals and a selection of studio sketches, some dating back years but all being shown publicly for the first time. For those who have heard of Ruth Franklin (she was voted "Best Established Visual Artist" by the readers of Creative Loafing in 2014) but have yet to see her art in person, this show is an excellent introduction to her talent.
Ruth has been called a 'painter's painter' by many of her peers, and "an important contemporary artist with a unique vision" by New York art critic Ed McCormack. One of the hardest working artists in the South, Franklin arrives in her studio before sunrise seven days a week and often works well into the evening. She received her BFA from Brighton Art School in the 1980s (where one of her classmates was Turner Prize winner Rachel Whiteread) at a time when conceptual art was all the rage, but she is essentially a self-taught artist. Franklin's art is pure expressionism, and her style is distinctly identifiable.
WHO/WHAT: Ruth Franklin's Only When I Laugh solo show of drawings and paintings
WHERE: DIFFERENT TRAINS GALLERY, 432 East Howard Avenue no. 24, Decatur GA 30030
WHEN: April 12 - June 22, 2019 / opening reception Friday, April 12, 5-9 pm, gallery hours: Thu-Sat, 11-5 + by appointment anytime