Trish Franey Helps Kids Tap Into Their Imagination

An apron can’t cover Trish Franey’s paint-splattered clothes after teaching a children’s art class at the Golden Eagle last week. Painting tiny birdhouses, fit for hummingbirds, she asked the kids, “Does anyone want eyeballs on their house?”“No, the birds will get scared!” one child answers.

She doesn’t talk down to the kids, but inevitably her dark humor flies over their heads. “No one gets my jokes,” she laughed.

“The kids are learning. They’re getting a piece of me, and I love that,” she said later during lunch at Rowdy Hall. “I want kids to be in the moment. That’s all we really have, is the moment.”

It brings her joy to see the kids tap into their imagination and creativity. “I love to see kids in their zone, no technology, no television,” she said.

Ms. Franey grew up a tomboy in northern New Jersey, with three older brothers and one younger sister, and attended parochial school, all themes in her work.

“I excelled at gym and art,” she said. “Back then, they didn’t know what dyslexia was, and I think that was my challenge, scholastically.”

Another challenge was her buck teeth. “My nickname was Bucky. It was horrible,” she said of the bullying. “It’s been going on forever, but it seems like it’s just getting attention now.”

“Prom Night,” her latest work, for Guild Hall’s 81st Artist Members Exhibition, opening Saturday, March 9, features five creatures who may not have buck teeth but do hark back to her school days.

“‘Prom Night’ is inspired by not getting asked to the senior prom, and all the girls that did, many of them mean girls,” she said. “I didn’t fit in but went to the prom anyway with a friend. I guess that’s why I painted them as monsters.”

Another work, “Cylinder Sally,” is a porcelain doll dressed in lace, fitted inside a rusted muffler pipe. Ms. Franey cut holes for her face and limbs.

“When I look at my work, it is a powerful force of healing from my childhood. It’s therapy for me to put my pain and frustration on canvas,” she said. “What a blessing. I have a colossal amount of gratitude to have this gift.”

Some people enjoy her work and find it whimsical and twisted. Others just find it twisted. “Good or bad, that’s my art,” she said.

Her artwork is considered “mixed medium, outsider art.” She is self taught. In fact, she didn’t start painting until she went to a show of 19 women artists curated by the late Vito Sisti at Ashawagh Hall, 17 years ago. “I want to do that,” she told herself at the time.

“I liked the vibe and the culture of it,” she said of the Springs art scene. “It was nice and not pretentious.” She sold out her first show there, which she called her “Ned and Bingo” series, a “funky” looking guy and his dog in different settings.

Her creative process is just as organic as her career. If she sees a rusted bottle cap in the road, she may use it for a detail on a canvas. She might smash a porcelain doll and use her eyeballs. “If I’m on the beach and find rope, I’ll cut it up and use it as texture for a duck or a maybe a dog,” she said.

She never uses a paintbrush. She uses her fingers to push French pastels that soften in water onto the canvas. “I stay in a soft pastel. I like warm colors,” she said. “I don’t use primary colors.”

She will use a pencil to sketch out a form, which she did during her time at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City where she studied fashion design and won top awards for it. But the stick-like figures of fashion are the antithesis of her artwork now.

After college, she worked for Guess Jeans in New York and was transferred to Los Angeles, but the West Coast was not a good fit. Back in New York, she got a job with Esprit. While skiing on the East Coast, she met her future husband, whose family had a home in East Hampton.

In 1998, the couple had an opportunity to purchase a wine shop in Springs, across the street from the Pollock-Krasner House, and they jumped at it.

“That was the rise and demise of my marriage,” she said. “We have two different personality types. He’s an oenophile. That’s his gift. He’s brilliant at it. I’m an artist,” she said, intently contemplating her iced tea.

Ms. Franey admitted she would rather glue corks to the sides of the wall than focus on sales, which didn’t bode well for the business or the marriage. When the couple divorced in 2006, she found herself the sole owner of Springs Wines & Liquors. “I’m blessed to have good workers at the wine shop,” she said.

More than anything, she is most proud of her daughter, who is 23 years old and close to home after attending college. “The best thing to happen to me was Raphaelle, for sure,” she said.

There were dark times when the only thing she could focus on was her health. She contracted Lyme disease and didn’t get better after treatment. Eventually, the Mayo Clinic diagnosed her with fibromyalgia. She believes that her Lyme was never cured, however. “It lays dormant and when you’re exhausted, run down or stressed out, it resurfaces,” she said. “It’s debilitating.”

Then, she had a spiritual awakening. “It wasn’t a moment like the skies opening,” she said.

“It was a very dark time of my life. Not being able to be myself, the self that I love.”

“My passion, my love for life was ripped from me. I try not to use the word depression. It was a manic funk,” she said.

For years, there was no artwork, or teaching. “I couldn’t function,” she said. “I was ready to sell the store, sell the house, and move back to New Jersey.”

Part of managing the disease was cutting toxic people out of her life, “even family.” But mostly, the road back to her health and her spirituality included a combination of walking her dog, Winston, a rescue from Last Chance Animal Rescue in Southampton, and praying.

Instead of going to church, she heads into Mother Nature. “I pray in the woods. I don’t get on my knees. I’m walking the dog,” she said.

Her favorite hike is Shadmoor State Park. “The cliffs of Montauk, overlooking the ocean—I’m sorry, it doesn’t get better than that,” she insists.

“No cellphone, just me and nature,” she said. “Being able to do that lets me think about what I have to do to get better.”

She has a lot of big plans. She’s in the process of writing not one, but two books. “The Adventures of Billy Bean Butt,” is an “interactive” children’s book. “Billy is a bully,” she said, bringing up a photo of Billy on her phone. “He has a mischievous face.”

The other book, “The Magic Turtle,” was inspired by her neighbor’s child who loves turtles but is not allowed to own one as a pet. “The magic turtle closes his eyes and wakes up in different places like Paris and learns about the culture,” she said.

Ms. Franey’s 1965 AirStream Bambi, which she calls “Rat Boy Production,” features prominently in her plans to host art classes for children. “I don’t do adults,” she said firmly. One goal is to take “Rat Boy” on the road, to visit hospitals and teach chronically ill children art classes.

“The world needs more love and kindness,” she said. “My mantra is ‘find your tribe.’”