Francis Cortland Tucker

Monday, June 10, 2013

Birds In Flight, November 2003

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Vespers, May 1999

Egg and Size on Gesso Panel, 15" x 12"
On verso: "Slanting Sun Work is Done, the Evening Stars' Song is Sung.

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

The Blueberry Bowl, 1979

Stand Oil and Venetian Turpentine
17" x 22"

Sunday, December 2, 2012

Moon Rising, Oct 2003 / Feb 2004

Egg and Size, 18 x 24

Sunday, October 21, 2012

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

What the Cricket Sang to Me, 2012

Gelatine Sizing 5" x 10"

Cascading Aria, 2012

Gelatine Sizing and Gum Arabic 28" x 19"

Carving the Light From the Moon to Dye the Mountain Stream, 2012

Gelatine Sizing, 17" x 10"

Monday, May 21, 2012

Monday, May 7, 2012

Geese Island, 1977

Oil on Panel Mounted to Board 8.25" x 10.5"

Friday, May 4, 2012

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Tucker and Daisy in the Morris Street Studio, 2012

Photo by Nell Slaughter, 2012

Monday, June 27, 2011

Summer's Middle Age, 1975

Walnut Oil on Linen, 19" x 24"

After a May Rain, 2006

Egg and Size

Blushing Moon In Love With A Swann, 2011

After A Summer Storm, 1977

Walnut Oil on Linen
20" x 24"
(aka, Thanksgiving Feast)

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

The Voice of the Turtle is Heard in our Land, 2010

Egg and Size, 19.75" x 13"

Where the Light Goes to Dance, 2010

Egg and Size, 18" x 23"

Mr. and Mrs. Browning Reading to Each Other

Bio

Francis Tucker has been a practicing painter since finishing his formal education in 1954. He painted full time and doing research in methods and materials, until finances pressed him to seek employment in 1957. At that time, he came under the employment of Carl Laughlin of Laughlin Frames, learning carving, gilding and preparation of museum mounts and care of artwork. He remained in this career for 20 years.

In 1967, he joined the faculty of the Philadelphia College of Art, Evening Division, under the Directorship of Jane Flory. Francis was instrumental in turning a painting class of 7 students into a full painting department, which employed 3 painting and drawing instructors. He created a formal curriculum for fine art students in materials and methods. He remained at this institution until 1978.

In 1977, he took employment with the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Francis and Terrence Fisher were able to upgrade the quality and expertise of installing works of art, which are still employed. In 1980, he moved into the Frame Shop of the Museum until 1982, when it merged with the Conservation Department. He then transferred to the Samuel S. Fleisher Art Memorial, taking the position of building supervisor and instructor.

Francis retains a studio and frame shop at 835 Morris Street. Currently working with egg tempera, size and watercolor, his expertise in these fields help him to search out the hidden places of the poetic muse. Artist and students seek out his help with aesthetic and technical problems.

The Brooklyn Museum of Art - Billy Collins

I will now step over the soft velvet rope
and walk directly into this massive Hudson River
painting and pick my way along the Palisades
with this stick I snapped off a dead tree.

I will skirt the smoky, nestled towns
and seek the path that leads always outward
until I become lost, without a hope
of ever finding the way back to the museum.

I will stand on the bluffs in nineteenth-century
clothes, a dwarf among rock, hills and flowing water,
and I will fish fro the banks in a straw hat,
which will feel like a brushstroke on my head.

And I will hide in the green covers of forests,
so no appreciator of Frederick Edwin Church,
leaning over the soft velvet rope,
'will spot my tiny figure moving in the stillness
and cry out, pointing for others to see,

and be thought mad and led away to a cell
where there is no vaulting landscape to explore,
none of this bird song that halts me in my tracks,
and no wide curving of this river that draws
my steps toward the misty vanishing point.

Senior Artist Initiative