Pia Fries was born 6^th October 1955 and is a swiss abstract painter.She was born in Beromunster Switzerland and studied sculpture in Lucerne in 1980, and painted under Gerhard Richter at the Kunstaka Dusseldorf in 1986.She lives and works in Dusseldorf in Munich.

Fries uses a wide variation of colours and textures onto wood panel primed with 6 or 7 layers.Her paintings are described as sophisticated yet energetic.The surface must be ridged for the process she uses.Her paintings also merge between painting/and or sculpture due to the techniques she uses.

Dana Friis-Hansen summarizes Pia Fries’ work in a comprehensive review: “Pia Fries is one of an emerging generation of painters whose work results from a conceptual and aesthetic wrestling match modernist painting, the dominant artistic expression of the twentieth century.’

For a few years Fries has taken on an interest in the work of Dutch draughtsman a,painter and engraver Hendrick Goltzius (1558-1617) one of the leading engravers of the early Notrherm Mannerisms period.She has decided to focus on two of his series ‘The Four Disgracers’ which delves into Greek mythology and the falls of Icarus,Tantalus.Ixion and Phaeton and ‘The Standard Bearers’.Both of these series are known for their technical elements and incredible compostions of which parts of this are reflected in Fries own work.