Last Friday, the news broke that the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation had donated 5 million dollars to artists affected during the Corona shutdown. I had seen this image of Helen in Provincetown, a young artist herself. Helen was in the midst of a great flowering of her talents at the Days Lumberyard a space she and Motherwell had rented for the summer of 1961. Take a look at the joie de vivre oozing from this photograph: the perfect little doorless Fiat convertible with straw seats, Helen in a sleeveless top or perhaps a bathing suit, waving a scarf, you can feel the warmth and the excitement of her life. Somehow this felt open and inspirational to me, the very opposite of shut-in.

Image: Frankenthaler in Fiat “Jolly,” 622 Commercial Street, Provincetown, summer 1961. Courtesy The Dedalus Foundation, Inc.