An early and brilliant example of what would become an obsession with the relationship between color and light, For Fred by Sam Francis is an exhilarating abstract work that experiments with tonality and saturation to create immense energy and tension in a two-dimensional space. Executed in 1949, the painting reveals how Francis was already developing his acute sensitivity to light and its characteristics at UC Berkeley, years before the enthusiastically colorful, large-scale paintings for which he has become famous. At this stage in his oeuvre, Francis was exploring the effects of contrast on color in the development of his inimitable style. For Fred exquisitely illustrates this interrogation through the multiplicity of crimson brushstrokes that dance dynamically outward across the canvas in varying degrees of saturation, highlighted by fl ashes of cobalt and chartreuse. White canvas is glimpsed between the ruby forms, yet through thin washes of oil paint, the alabaster is activated to heighten each orb of color. Each individual shape echoes the stroke of his brush, translucent towards the center of the painting and more saturated around the peripheries, developing a kinetic energy that radiates from the center of the canvas in the lightest of forms.

It is this juxtaposition of opaque, saturated paint against thin washes of color that most precisely epitomizes Francis’s unique understanding of the relationship between light, color, and space. The gradations of tone, as they sweep outward from the center toward the edges of the canvas, emphasize the flatness of the plane, yet the subtle layers of color paradoxically add immense depth, movement, and energy. The hypnotizing network of organically interwoven zones of color that describe the compositional structure of For Fred become ever more impactful and outstanding atop the utter stillness of the calm white that underlies them.

In For Fred, beams of e! ervescent pigment converge at the center of the canvas in an eruption of color; as the eye moves out, this pulsating web clarifies into individual beams that firmly anchor the piece at the borders of the canvas. There is a strong, stabilizing verticality to the central form, though Francis never paints a single line. Instead, shimmering buds of rose and scarlet bloom with abandon across the canvas, interspersed with hints of lime and a splash of electric ultramarine. Between these interwoven beams of riotous pigment, zones of depthless white o! er a quiet purity that counterbalances the frenetic energy of Francis’s brush. For Fred thus exemplifies the artist’s profound fascination with color. “Color is a kind of holy substance for me,” he has said. “It’s the element in painting which I am most fascinated with. It is an element of painting which overcomes me… Color in a way is a receptacle for a feeling and a way for you to hold it until understanding arrives or meaning is extracted” (Francis quoted in Sam Francis, dir. Michael Blackwood, 1975–76).