Frea Buckler’s practice spans abstract painting, printmaking, sculpture, installation and public art. Working with colour, form and found materials, she creates compositions that move between two and three dimensions. Surfaces, structures and objects are brought together through a language of colour, rhythm and balance, often incorporating reused or discarded materials. The work explores improvisation, adaptation and transformation, allowing materials and ideas to shift and evolve through the process of making.

She considers her practice a form of collecting. Materials, shapes, colours and contrasts are gathered over time. Metaphorically, this bag of collected elements is emptied onto a table and arranged into new relationships. Forms are grouped into compositions that respond to the inherent qualities of the materials themselves. Rather than imposing a hierarchy, she reads their attributes, placing forms and colours together in ways that allow each to support and celebrate the other.

Her process is playful and experimental, yet considered and methodical. Improvisation and intuition allow unexpected relationships to emerge between forms, textures and colours. Through this approach, she explores themes of transformation, beauty and the quiet movements of the subconscious that shape how we see and feel.

Underlying the work is an ethic of care. The act of arranging materials becomes an allegory for how we might exist alongside one another, allowing difference, supporting individuality and creating balance through attention and generosity.

Frea Buckler studied Fine Art at Central Saint Martins and an MA in Multidisciplinary Printmaking at the University of the West of England, Bristol. She has presented solo shows in London, Dublin, Brussels and the USA. She has participated in group shows internationally with galleries including Swinton Gallery, Madrid, Espace Transmission, Montreal and Davidson Gallery, New York.

She has been commissioned for projects by organisations including Facebook, Imperial Health Charity, Ginkgo Projects and Denver Art Museum. Her work is held in many private collections. Public collections include the University of Warwick, University of Edinburgh, Trinity College Dublin, Imperial Health Charity Collection, The National Archives of Ireland and the Office of Public Works, Ireland. Frea currently lives and works in Bristol.