Frederic Tuten, novelist, short story writer, memoirist, and art critic, had youthful creative stirrings that inclined him toward painting. In this recent interview, in what he called "the winter of my life--although I don't feel cold," Tuten told me of his adolescent fantasy of moving to an artist's garret in Paris which he would share with a beautiful woman (he pictured actress Leslie Caron) who would serve as lover, muse, and model.
After a lifetime on the periphery of the art world--writing about leading artists of the day such as Robert Rauschenberg, George Segal, and his close friend, Roy Lichtenstein-- Tuten explains how he came to make his own drawings and paintings. How at an advanced age he found a joyous new career, creating art that is now sold through galleries and which is the subject of a 2022 book, "On a Terrace in Tangiers." The joy Tuten feels in creation radiates from the cardboard and canvas images and, as you will shortly see, delivers the pleasure in the viewer which he declares is his goal.