Marilyn Levin
Marilyn Levin is an artist and art educator living in San Francisco, CA and Boston, MA. She received her MFA in Painting from UCLA, where she studied with Richard Diebenkorn. Levin has exhibited in the United States, Europe, and India. Her work is represented in many public and private collections as well as several museums, including The San Francisco MOMA, the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, the Kresge Collection at Harvard University, and the Sanskriti Museum in Delhi, India.
She has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, the Sanskriti Foundation, and the Massachusetts Cultural Council. She has taught in the Tufts/Museum School Dual Degree program for over 25 years, as well as workshops in Massachusetts, Italy, and Mexico. Her recent work – non-traditional portraits, metallic abstractions, drop cloths, and repurposed cardboard boxes – express her reaction to difficult political times and environmental degradation.
Artist Statement
I believe that the mystery of what an artist really means plays itself out from within. So the painting grows, develops and often changes during the process of painting. I build my surfaces with layers of oil paint, pouring paint over these surfaces and scraping through layers revealing a multitude of color from underneath.
The beauty of the Bay Area has always inspired my paintings. This latest body of work reflects my fascination with the play between the light and the mysteries of the water – what we see on the surface and beneath. What are the possibilities of finding a story within these darks and lights, these patterns, these colors?
I hope my work evokes a visceral and intellectual response from my viewers.