Bio
Carol Steinberg has exhibited nationally in numerous galleries and museums. She has taught drawing, design, and painting at Los Angeles City College, Cal State University at Northridge, and Otis Evening College. She earned her MFA at Cal Arts and BFA and BA from Cornell University and has received scholarships from art programs around the country—including Atlantic Center for the Arts, Seattle’s Realist Academy, Scottsdale Artists School (multiple years).
Her work has been published, won prizes, been listed as an LA Times “Best Bet” and chosen for Eddie Murphy’s film Daddy Day Care, as well as other film and TV projects. In the fall of 2008, a dozen of her paintings appeared on the award winning TV show House in an episode about a painter with a disturbing vision problem.
In August 2013, she had a one woman show at Copperwood Gallery in Orange, CA. She participates biannually in the prestigious Beverly Hills Art Show as well as other local shows from Paso Robles to San Diego. She has participated in the Los Gatos Plein Air Invitational in 2014, 2016 and 2019. She won first prize in Los Angeles’ first Plein Air Festival in 2014. She also won first prize in the monthly contest on DailyPaintWorks in 2015. She won Second Prize in the Yosemite Renaissance 32 Competition and Exhibition in 2017.
I taught drawing for 23 years at Los Angeles City College, mostly to beginners, so I’ve been through Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain 40 times. On my own, I studied for over a decade with 3 master draftsmen: Vilpuu, Gnass, and Huston. I have a deep appreciation for the importance of drawing!
I also minored in Art History at Cornell University—the ongoing story of artistic creation in different times and cultures, particularly Western, informs my art production.
I earned an MFA from CalArts, where, at the time, it seemed like I’d be expelled if I painted a still life. Consequently, I experimented with a lot of autobiographical content—in everything from oils to printout on a new (primitive) Mac computer to installations with paintings and audio narration to videos—one of which is archived at The Kitchen (an avant garde art space in NYC). I was even called by a critic from the Village Voice because she loved it that much.
I started painting at 8 when my Dad got me a little oil painting set.
I work mostly from life, frequently setting up a still life on my porch or painting the view from my third-floor apartment in West Los Angeles—which looks surprisingly like a French countryside, though larger buildings are springing up all the time. I have a studio with special lighting, and if I can talk someone into posing, I love that too. Or, I sometimes use my own photos as a starting point.
When I’m not painting, I have a 40 year old yoga practice.
A car accident and forced retirement, both about 5 years ago, have allowed me to devote full time to my lifelong pursuit of an art career. It’s darkest before the dawn.