Steven Seinberg is a Brooklyn-born painter whose lyrical, gestural abstractions span nearly three decades of exploration into nature, perception, and the poetics of mark-making.
With an BFA from Atlanta College of Art and MFA from Georgia State University, he has exhibited widely across the U.S. and Europe, including recent solo shows at Galerie Benjamin Eck (Munich), Galeria São Mamede (Lisbon), Johnson Lowe Gallery (Atlanta, GA), and the Foosaner Art Museum (Florida). Seinberg’s atmospheric canvases and collages (often compared to the legacies of Twombly, Rothko, and Turner) translate the rhythms of the natural world and emotional memory into layered fields of movement, stillness, and light.
Critics describe his work as “visual poetry,” where smudges, drips, and lines form not just compositions but contemplative spaces that engage the senses beyond sight. Held in major public and corporate collections, including the Columbia Museum of Art and Asheville Art Museum, Seinberg’s work invites viewers into a world where abstraction becomes a quiet, enduring conversation with the forces that shape our lives.
Steven Seinberg currently lives and works in Asheville, NC and Lisbon, Portugal.
After living as an artist for decades, do you think it has given you a different way of seeing the world? Noticing things that most people don’t? When you take long walks, do you ask yourself certain questions or are you deliberately paying attention to contrasts, to signs of something — life and death, relationships, hidden connections?
I do feel that I have a way of seeing the world that is different. I think creative people are maybe more in tune with everything around them. The smells and sounds, the light and dark, the movement.
I like to walk and explore… there are surprises and new connections everywhere. The experience of this and the pieces I remember become parts of my work in some way.
Where do you feel your art comes from? Is it a deeply personal, one-on-one conversation with yourself, God, the Universe, or something else? Or do you see it more as an intellectual process — solving visual and conceptual challenges that arise in the act of painting?
My work is very personal and what I choose to investigate and pursue is personal. But once the piece begins it also becomes more of a conversation with the painting and a back and forth in an effort to solve a visual problem or a challenge of balance and intention.
Do you think artists should engage in more conversations with each other, as they did in the past through artist networks and salons, to understand which themes are “in the air”? Is others’ feedback or reflections on your work necessary?
How do you feel about the idea that certain ideas exist beyond individuals, waiting to be expressed — and if one artist ignores them, they might find their way through someone else, as Rick Rubin suggests?
I do think it is helpful when artists get together and discuss art and making art. This dialogue is not something that I feel I get enough of as most of us spend a lot of time alone and in a the studio.
Putting this into words and hearing it often helps my focus and getting this opportunity to hear from other artists about their current work and thoughts is often inspiring.
Are there any real rules in making art? You once left a school because they tried to impose rules on how art should be made. At the same time, you’ve spoken about developing your own art as a language, setting your own rules and changing them if necessary. But balance is always key. If you had to give advice to a young artist today, what rules — if any — would you say apply to making art?
I don’t think that there are really any rules in making art. I think the artist must make his or her own rules and decisions to create and solve their own problems. If I were giving advice (even to myself), it would be to be open to trying anything that you are thinking about in your work. Search for truth.
Sparseness, calmness, maybe minimalism, too? Quiet movements — the opposite of noise, loudness, the constant chatter of the world today. A new generation is growing up with TikTok, always connected. Solitude and connectedness mean something different to them than they did for your generation.
Do you think people today, or in the future, will still appreciate silence and subtlety? Or is that a disappearing element, an ability lost over time? Or do people naturally reach for it with maturity?
I do feel that the solitude and quietness is important in much of my work. The connection that people have with my work is the opposite of the immediacy of the world today. It is a slower and hopefully a more meaningful relationship. I think this breath is more needed than ever.
Composer Arvo Pärt has said that to create, you have to start with yourself: your inner thoughts, how you see the world, how you think about yourself and others. Do you engage with this aspect of creation too?
All of my work does start with myself…. My thoughts and my place in the world, my connection to people and places. I want my work to be some kind of reflection of now. For me, it has to be personal.
Do you stay updated on what’s happening in the art world: other artists’ work, new movements? Is it an inspiration, or does it become a distraction, leading to comparisons? Some see the art world as a competition — artists competing for the eyes of viewers. How do you see it?
There does seem to be a lot of competition in the art world. I don’t often feel that I am competing with other artists, but I have experienced this.
I do like to see current work and what other artists are making. I think I go through periods of wanting to look at and explore other work and other times where I find it necessary to ignore all of that and just focus on what I am doing. For me, it interests me to see the connections in my work to artists in other parts of the world. The language begins to feel universal.
RELIQUARY II, 2024
Steven Seinberg
Oil, acrylic, charcoal, and graphite on canvas
70 × 120 in
SHIFT, 2024
Steven Seinberg
Oil, acrylic, charcoal, and graphite on canvas
60 × 50 in
HIS EYES WERE CLOSED..., 2024
Steven Seinberg
Oil, charcoal, and graphite on canvas
59 × 59 in
MY WORDS VANISH (2), 2023
Steven Seinberg
Oil, acrylic, charcoal, and graphite on canvas
60 × 120 in
BOOK PAGES, 2023
Steven Seinberg
Mixed media on found book pages
7 × 10 in
PORTAL, 2024
Steven Seinberg
Mixed media on paper
20 × 15 in
THE SKY OPENS, 2024
Steven Seinberg
Mixed media on paper
20 × 15 in
FALLING LIGHT, 2024
Steven Seinberg
Mixed media on paper
20 × 30 in
SHE FLOWS WITHOUT MOVING, 2024
Steven Seinberg
Oil, charcoal and graphite on canvas
80 × 70 in
Connect with the Artist
All images courtesy of the artist.
