Sylvia Levine

1911–1998, English

Tags: Painting

Sylvia Levine began painting in 1956, taking art classes part-time at the West of England School of Art in Queens Road, Bristol, but little heeding the advice of tutors there. While buying supplies for the class, she purchased a flexible palette knife recommended by an employee at the art store. Her penchant for using this tool accounts for the impasto and rough surfaces of her oil paintings. Her subjects include nude figures, portraits, seascapes, still lifes, and the English countryside. She enjoyed frequenting galleries in London and once painted an interior scene of one.

Levine’s work was frequently featured in exhibitions held by the Royal Academy and has been shown at the Carl Hammer Gallery in Chicago, the Museum of American Folk Art in New York, and throughout England. She lived in Bristol until her death.