Fratino’s subjects are comfortable in their own skin, unafraid of being seen.
Progressive because the men in the paintings are clearly gay. “Come Softly To Me” offers 25 new paintings that vary in scale and oscillate between modernist figure paintings and progressive celebrations of the male form. Writing for the New York Times in 2017, legend Roberta Smith said Fratino’s work is “hot with painterly attention and erudition.” On my stop in to “Come Softly To Me,” his first solo show with Sikkema Jenkins & Co., I overheard a gay man (serving as cultural attaché) telling his friends from out of town, “It’s a gay show. His fans, both critics and pedestrians alike can see his technical drafting and beautifully rendered cocks. Louis Fratino has an informal, homoerotic Instagram account where he posts figure studies.
