Stephanie Kossmann is an American artist and Canadian immigrant. She was raised in a coastal town in Massachusetts and lived and worked in Ontario and Vermont with interludes in New York and Miami. She is based in the arts and historic hub of Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia. Kossmann’s abstractions are ripe with subtleties. She combines oil paints and etching inks for translucency.
Typically painting with her hands so that she can feel the materials and support, Kossmann builds and scrapes surfaces yielding remarkable textures and depth. Using appreciative inquiry as an approach to portraiture, she bypasses physicality to portray the inner life of her subjects. The method helps her subjects shift their perspective and move creatively towards a desired future by focusing on strengths, qualities, and achievements rather than merely overcoming deficiencies.
Typically painting with her hands so that she can feel the materials and support, Kossmann builds and scrapes surfaces yielding remarkable textures and depth. Using appreciative inquiry as an approach to portraiture, she bypasses physicality to portray the inner life of her subjects. The method helps her subjects shift their perspective and move creatively towards a desired future by focusing on strengths, qualities, and achievements rather than merely overcoming deficiencies.
