Artists in Conversation | Natalie Frank

Natalie Frank, Yale BA 2002, will talk to Margaret Spillane, lecturer in English and tutor in the Poorvu Center for Teaching and Learning, Yale University, about her artistic practice, recent projects, and the influence of artist Paula Rego on her practice. 

About Natalie Frank

Born in the United States in 1980, Natalie Frank is an interdisciplinary artist whose drawings, paintings, and work in performance design focus on the intersection of sexuality and violence in feminist portraiture. Her work is marked by disturbing and explicit subject matter, and it often blurs lines between reality and fantasy. Frank earned her BA in studio art from Yale University in 2002 and her MFA in visual arts from Columbia University in 2006. In 2003, Frank was a Fulbright scholar at the Oslo National Academy of the Arts in Norway.

The Portuguese-British artist Paula Rego (1935–2022) was a mentor to Frank. They met in 2001, when the Yale Center for British Art was planning the exhibition Paula Rego: Celestina's House and Frank was an undergraduate at Yale University. During a friendship that spanned twenty years, Rego inspired Frank to begin to draw and to create her first series, titled Grimms’ Tales, which expanded on the fairy tales collected and recorded by the Brothers Grimm. In 2019, Ballet Austin commissioned the production of Grimm Tales, a full-length ballet based on Frank’s drawings. Frank served as the artistic director of the project, collaborating with artists on sets, costumes, animations, and textile designs. Recently, she served as artistic director of Liz Phair’s Exile in Guyville 30th anniversary tour and made art for The Crowded Room (Apple TV+) and Evil (Paramount+).

Frank has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions. Her work may be found in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago; Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas at Austin; Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME; Brooklyn Museum of Art; Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, MA; and the Yale University Art Gallery, among others. She lives and works in New York City.