Jared French

Before we get into Jared French (1905-1988), let’s clear up a common mix-up—he’s not Jim French of Colt Studio fame. Different era, different world. Jared was working about 40 years earlier, embedded in that downtown New York circle with Paul Cadmus, George Platt Lynes, and George Tooker—a tight, queer-leaning creative orbit where painting, photography, and desire all overlapped. He’s often a quieter name in that lineup, but he was very much in the room where it all was happening.

1. Evasion - Jared French

2. Portrait of Jared French - Luigi Lucioni

French is a great example of what Michel Foucault was getting at when he pushed back on the myth of the lone genius. None of these artists were operating in isolation—they were building something together.

2. Jared French - PaJaMa (Fire Island)

3. Nude Studies - Jared French

French painted in egg tempera, worked in that eerie “magic realism” mode, and used photography less as an end product and more as a tool—reference, study, a way to understand the body. 

4. The Double - Jared French

5. That French Beach - Jared French

He moved fluidly between roles: artist, model, collaborator. Sometimes in front of the lens, sometimes behind it, always part of the exchange.

6. Ted Starkowski and Chuck Howard - Jared French

And then there’s the PaJaMa circle—Paul, Jared, and his wife Margaret Hoening French—summering on Fire Island, staging these intimate, often nude photographs with a rotating cast of artists, dancers, and writers. 

8. Mel Felini Nude Studies (for sculpture below) - Jared French

9. Untitled (Plaster) - Jared French (based on Mel Felini nude studies #8 above)

It wasn’t just documentation—it was play, performance, community. French may not get the same spotlight as Cadmus or Lynes, but he’s woven through their work in essential ways. One of those connective figures who reminds us that queer history, like art itself, is almost never a solo act.

10. Mealtime: The Early Coal Miners Study For Plymouth, PA, Post Office Mural - Jared French

11. Jarad French - PaJaMa

Thoughts?

Would love to hear your take on that period with Cadmus, Lynes, and all the other celebrated art figures of this period, including his wife, Margaret.  I find it all beyond fascinating.