Steven Harvey Fine Arts

Some people are devotees of painting. They analyze the trace of every brushstroke and savor the Ins and outs of its history. Steven Harvey is one of those people. His tiny storefront on tree-lined Forsyth Street is an oasis for anyone who loves painting made in New York within the last 75 years.

The painters featured here are linked, directly or in spirit, to the New York Studio School of Painting, Drawing, and Sculpture, founded in 1964 and still thriving today. Many of the best Postwar American artists and European émigrés taught or studied there.

Step into the gallery, which smells faintly of turpentine and old wood, and you’re pulled into this lineage. You’ll see still lifes, landscapes, portraits, and easel-sized nudes that nod to 20th-century French traditions, but vibrate with the restless energy of downtown NYC. Classic, yes. But alive, vital, and very much of this city.

Be sure to sign up for their Zoom art talks with local critics.

Steven Harvey grew up in New York's 1970s and '80s art scene, the son of working artists. He studied painting at the New York Studio School before taking on roles as an art advisor, curator, and writer. He opened his namesake gallery on the Lower East Side in 2007.