1) Naked woman standing with arms crossed; 2) Head of a Woman; 3) Head and Shoulders of a Woman

Stephen Finer specialises in painting portraits, portraits of people that display their humanity while preserving their anonymity. Heads, torsos, nudes - all in the familiar studio pose, yet rendered in a series of thick brushstrokes. Finer uses a palette of astonishing variation that obliterates the identifying features, without diminishing the basic human content of the subject. These three paintings are all prime examples of Finer's recourse to abstract portraiture on canvas; in Naked Woman Standing with Arms Crossed the subject stands facing the viewer, at once exposed physically within an empty background, yet remaining psychologically ambiguous. The Towner holds a significant body of abstract work to which these 3 works by Finer make a valuable contribution.