Francis spent some time in Paris executing entirely monochromatic works, but his mature pieces are generally large oil paintings with splashed or splattered areas of bright contrasting colour. Areas of white canvas are often left to show through, and in later works, paint is sometimes confined to the edges of the canvas.
Francis returned to California during the 1960s[1] and continued painting in Los Angeles. During the final three decades of his career his style of large scale bright Abstract expressionism was also closely associated with Color field painting. During the last year of his life, suffering from prostate cancer and unable to paint with his right hand after a fall, in a final burst of energy he used his left hand to complete a dazzling series of about 150 small paintings before he died. He was buried in Olema, in Marin County, California.[2]
In the wake of the artist death, the Samuel L. Francis Foundation, Inc. (also know as the "Samuel L. Francis Art Museum, Inc." or the "Sam Francis Foundation") was founded. The Foundation not only serves as his official Estate, but also has a mission "to research, document, protect and perpetuate the creative legacy of [Francis]."[3] The U.S. copyright representative for the Francis Foundation is the Artists Rights Society[4].
As of 2008, the Foundation is working to create a Catalogue Raisonné of Francis's work.[5] In addition to collecting information on known Francis works, they also have a page dedicated to "missing works"[6] for which they are seeking any information interested parties may have.
