Marvin Sosna

For most of my life I was a wordsmith, using words as a journalist, then a novelist and then a poet to describe what I saw, heard, felt. In the latter part of my 93 years, I'm using paint and canvas to do it. This venue of abstract expressionism offers me a vast horizon where intellect and emotion merge into a single entity free of restraint.

I am self-taught but have had absentee tutors – DeKoonig, Diebenkorn, Sam Francis – in museums where I approached their works from a distance, then grew near, followed their brushstrokes, saw their intelligence, mastery of their media.

In my work, brush and palette knife are the artists. I start with a canvas, select colors, choose an instrument and let it go free. It can create small strokes, broad sweeps, droplets, cross-hatches in colors that it chooses, usually wet-on-wet, and then a structure emerges, a painting anchored on a firm base, side pillars rising to a more open area above. I step away, turn and face it, looking for balance, unity, the presence of a thing worth studying and offering beauty as a reward. Usually, there's more work to do and so the process re-invents, continues, and – it's done.

I live and have my studio in Morro Bay, am a father and grandfather (my wife of almost 64 years, Ethel Sosna, passed away in 2017), and, until Covid-19, I enjoyed gym workouts and long walks. In former years, I was an ardent High Sierra backpacker.

Thanks for reading this and spending time with my works. This exhibit could never have happened without the skill and patience of my daughter, Laurie Sosna, a master of digital magic.