Art Has No Age Limit

By Barry F. Scher

What does an octogenarian and a nonagenarian have in common? If you are Dr. William “Bill” Collins and Jack Frazier, you are both abstract Annapolis area professional artists who are still painting away at ages 84 and 95.

When others their age may dream of spending their time rocking away on the front porch, these two artists say they just have no interest in slowing down.

Collins is an 84-year-old Severna Park resident with numerous college degrees including a doctorate among his many academic achievements. Throughout his life, he has been an actor, teacher, high school principal, college professor, and a licensed psychologist. 

“I started to paint over 50 years ago but with an active career I just never had adequate time to devote to painting—until the pandemic hit,” he says. “As a psychologist, my work focused on one-on-one inter-personal relationships with patients. COVID-19 ended all that. So, at my age, with urging from family and friends, I made a career decision to devote full time to painting. As a former actor, I like to call this my ‘final act’.”

Collins plans to display his paintings in his new studio, WN Collins Gallery and Studio (wncollins.com), in the Annapolis Arts District at 162 West Street.

Collins says he prefers vivid acrylics and distinct lines and lets his emotions guide him as he works exclusively with a brush to paint the backgrounds and then a palette knife to finish the painting. “Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and paint to fill a creative void and it gives me a sense of accomplishment,” he said. “One must enjoy color, form, and geometric shapes and that’s what I transmit from my thoughts to the canvas.”

Jack Frazier, at age 95, paints from his studio in his condominium at GrandView at Annapolis Town Center in Parole. His home is full of his abstracts and other artworks, but many of his paintings are on display at Main St. Gallery in downtown Annapolis. 

Frazier’s paintings have been featured in the gallery for the past nine years. “As soon as we started to carry his work, he started selling almost immediately,” says gallery owner Margaret Lee. “People love his art, and they see things in his work, shapes, and forms that elicit a curiosity in them that’s amazing.”

Like Collins, Frazier did not begin his working years as an artist. He, too, has had a varied and diverse career. As a teenager, he was a boxer in the Golden Gloves Association. After he graduated high school, he did a stint in the U.S Navy; he went to flight school and flew on board torpedo bombers. After the Navy, Frazier attended the National Art School in Washington, D.C., but he knew being a struggling artist would not pay the bills, so he landed a job at the Pentagon. He also had a love affair with Porsches and started to race them. “It was fun, but I knew I had to settle down, so I focused my career on doing analytical consulting which gave me time to work on my art and I have been painting ever since the mid-1960s,” he says. “To date I have participated in dozens and dozens of art shows in locations throughout Virginia and Maryland. Painting gives me purpose within my lifestyle and, at 95, I may not be as active as I once was, but I still enjoy painting and making others happy with my work.” 

Frazier’s work also features bold colors and use of a palette knife

Both men followed their passions and are living proof that creative expression never retires.