Art On The Side

UWF alumna Frances Barrineau says she cannot remember a time when she did not consider herself a painter. Born in Atmore, Ala., she lived in Japan and West Germany, where her father, an Army officer, was stationed. When he retired from the service in 1957, the family settled in Northwest Florida.

Barrineau, who was in UWF's first graduating class, says there was a sense that something new was being created as she attended classes in studio art.

"Living in a small Gulf Coast city did not exactly offer great opportunities for artists," she says, "so I painted at night and on weekends when I could, and held various day jobs to pay the bills. I felt that I was making progress, but I wasn't interested in showing my work yet. Many of my friends were not even aware that I painted. I think that overall, it was a good way to work, in the sense that there was no outside pressure to push me in one direction or another, and so my work could develop naturally and in its own way.

Prompted by interest in joining the Foreign Service as a cultural attache in the late 1980s, Barrineau studied French in Quebec and completed a master's degree in international affairs at Florida State University.

"My points didn't quite hit the mark so the State Department didn't offer me a post. In retrospect, this was a good thing, because it threw me back on myself and I had to face the fact that the only thing I was ever really interested in was being an artist," she says.

Barrineau married NASA engineer Mark Littlefield,'87 BS,'90 MS, in 1990. "In 1991 he offered me the opportunity to paint full time. With the chance to work more intensely, I could see that I was leap-frogging into my future, and it became apparent to me that I wanted to show."

She'll be exhibiting with alumna Barbara Resler Weeks,'69 BS,'73 MA, and Roger Weeks during the Pensacola Cultural Center exhibit Oct. 27 to Dec. 7. Her works are also on display at Justine's Milam Gallery in Dallas, Texas. Daughter Michelle Gaston Littlefield, born in 1992, shares Barrineau's Dallas studio and is helping start a family painting tradition using her mother's old easel. The artist's e-mail address is: artistfran@earthlink.net. She invites other artists to discuss online portfolios and exhibits. --Ann Hill

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Sign of the Cat Copyright © 1994, Frances Barrineau. All Rights Reserved.