Frances Schifflette Hicks
Floating Cubes
1980s
Acrylic on paper attached to mat board
22.5”x15” overall 28”x22”
Signed lower right in paint
Excellent Condition - Minor wear consistent with age and history. Mat board has crease.
Frances Shifflette Hicks (1914-2000)
(From Lost Art Salon)
Frances Shifflette Hicks was included in over 250 exhibitions during her lifetime; including a significant one-woman show in 1968. Themes from her extensive travels, including museum tours with SFMOMA, often appear in her work. Hicks studied under Bay Area artists, Lundy Siegrist and Peter Brown. In 1976 the San Francisco Festival of the Arts awarded her a solo show, and she received the Janet Langmaid Award at the Oakland Art Association in 1981.
The following is a feature written about Frances Shifflette Hicks by Pauline Blanc for the Bulletin of the San Francisco Womens Artists in 1994:
When one writes a biographical sketch of an artist, usually that subject has been artist all his or her life. In the case of Frances Hicks, art entered her life later and by a circuitous route. She was born on a ranch in Marble Falls, in the hill country of Texas, the eight of nine children. Across a winding river is the University of Texas in Austin, where she graduated with a teaching degree. While teaching in Houston, she met and married Larry Hicks, ad executive with the Clorox Company.
Fran says of the period when her two daughters were growing up in Lafayette, “I did the usual ‘mother things’ – Brownies, Girl Scouts, PTA…..I satisfied my creative urges by designing and making our clothes – with emphasis on gorgeous hats – which were eventually donated to the Oakland Museum’s White Elephant Sale. I tried my hand at fiction writing and had one story published. At that point I felt a strong urge to paint and took lessons with Alice Jung, Lundy Siegrist and Peter Brown. Then I knew my search was over. I was ‘home’ at last.
She learned the basics from these artists, but her own work reflects her intuitive feelings. She works in various styles – oils, acrylics, and mixed media. From the start she has kept a faithful record of the more than 180 juried shows she entered, most were in the greater Bay Area.
In 1976 the San Francisco Festival of the Arts awarded her a solo show at the San Mateo Hearst Courthouse, one month in the Art Council Gallery and another month in the Daly Civic Center. Still other one-woman shows were at the Lucien Labaudt Gallery (1969), the Valley Art Center in Walnut Creek and the Finex Company Gallery in San Francisco (1991).
She received the Janet Langmaid Award at the Oakland Art Association in 1981. Other shows were solo invitational at Valley Art Center in Walnut Creek (1988), four juried exhibitions at Nordstrom Stores, and the following year a Copy Art Invitational at Walnut Creek Library.
Like so many artists, she finds much inspiration in travel. She has joined museum tours with SFMOMA to Spain, Morocco, Portugal, L.A., Denver, Santa Fe and Houston. On her own, she visited Argentina, England, the Far East and Alaska.
Francis has been an outstanding member of the San Francisco Women Artists since 1969. She served as Exhibition Chair, Program Chair, Vice-President, Historian, and on the Nominating Committee. Since our move to our own galleries on Hayes Street, she has won nine awards, in the thirty-six shows she entered. She says of her association with SFWA that it has been an inspiration; it is her fervent wish that we will always uphold high standards in what we do and the work we show.
Fran’s inner assurance and great presence have contributed in large measure to her success. She is in charge of herself.
Pauline Blanc, published in 1994 for the Bulletin of the San Francisco Women Artists.
