Work / 03
San Francisco oil painter · forty years of work in oil
A painter’s site that became his catalog: 61 paintings, each with its own page and a way to ask about it.
May to September 2026 · captures taken 2026-10-07 and 2026-10-11
Published with Matthew Frederick’s permission.
Left: mjfrederickart.com as it loads today. Right: the staging site, switched to its day theme and on the first room of its slideshow, captured the same day at the same size.
The new site as it stands on staging. It opens in its night theme; its day and night switch shows the day theme used on this page.
What the design aimed for
Pre-verbal arousal: the nervous system registering trust, relevance, and forward momentum before the analytical mind engages.
For Matthew Frederick: a visitor’s first impression lands on “serious San Francisco oil painter, gallery-grade craft.”
Checkpoint 01 · First 50 milliseconds
The visitor has not read a word yet. In my audit in May, his site’s first impression resolved to “competent Squarespace template,” not “established SF oil painter.”
The same two first screens on a phone, captured 2026-10-11; the staging site in its day theme.
Decisions
Clear the fifty-millisecond trust gate so attention switches on at all.
A photograph from his own Instagram fills the first screen, so the first thing a visitor sees is the work installed rather than the work isolated: his South Tower Golden Gate, in a collection in Seattle. On a phone the room comes first, with the words beneath it.
Clear the fifty-millisecond trust gate so attention switches on at all.
On his site today, the header logo is a cut-out of his painting David. Here his name is set in Copperplate, the engraved capitals he chose, in the header and on the first screen.
Paste-ready line
“The painter is the hero, and so are the rooms.”
Checkpoint 02 · First 30 seconds
His About page today has a portrait, a paragraph about the paintings and his statement. None of his record is on it: no shows, no gallery, nothing he founded.
Decisions
Design for what the reader actually does, not what they would say they want in a focus group.
The first screen stays painter-led, and four lines below it carry the record: forty years of practice, the studio, his gallery and the gallery he co-founded. His About page today has none of it.
Free the working memory the reader needs to process the page at all.
Make the page easy to read so the content feels true.
The 61 paintings group into ten series, some by subject, some by period. Four lead on the home page, each linked to its series.
Paste-ready line
“The gap was perceptual, not factual. The facts were already there. The old site simply had no machinery for showing them.”
Checkpoint 03 · The full session
On his site today, Narcissus is one captioned thumbnail among eleven flower paintings. It opens a larger view and nothing more; to ask about it, a visitor finds the contact page.
Decisions
Structure the page so the right action is the easiest action.
Each of the 61 paintings has its own page: the painting, its title, size, medium and year, and “Inquire about this work”, which opens the inquiry form.
What should change
A collector should be able to ask about one painting from its own page.
Check after launch: how many inquiries name a painting, in the record the platform keeps of each one.
Paste-ready line
“Inquiry, not cart. The price tier decided the primitive.”
The method
Free the working memory the reader needs to process the page at all.
Clear the fifty-millisecond trust gate so attention switches on at all.
Make the page easy to read so the content feels true.
Design for what the reader actually does, not what they would say they want in a focus group.
Structure the page so the right action is the easiest action.
Result
Built on staging, set to replace his current site once he settles his prices and terms.
Paid engagement, signed after he saw the first build.
For branding, brand development and marketing strategy.