Meditating on her surroundings -- the Catskills' fields, light, mountains and sky -- Ms. Freda infuses suggestions of natural elements (the movement of wind through branches; the color of fall foliage; a moonlit night) into her pared-down palette and calligraphic strokes.

In most of Ms. Freda's 29 pictures (all from 2010) there is discordance among the severe geometries, layered wax grounds and expressionistic strokes. But occasionally -- as in the fleeting black and white "Night Light," the rustling orange "Tilled Field," the delicate winter sunset "Western Sky" and the bold, muscular dance of blood and fire that is "Red Sky at Night" -- Ms. Freda, internalizing and synthesizing a range of influences, achieves brevity, poetry.