BIO

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Deborah Wasserman was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, grew up in the Middle East, and currently resides in Queens, New York, one of the most diverse counties in the US. She is a graduate of the California Institute of the Arts, the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program, Artists in the Marketplace at the Bronx Museum of the Arts, and received two fellowships from the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. She has exhibited in the United States, at the Queens Museum of the Arts, Bronx Museum of the Arts, White Columns, Pierogi 2000, Socrates Sculpture Park, Jonathan Ferrara Gallery, and A.I.R. Gallery. Internationally, she has shown in Brazil, the Netherlands, Germany, and Israel. Wasserman has been the recipient of grants from the Experimental Television Center, Aljira Center for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, New York State Department of Cultural Affairs, The Puffin Foundation, Queens Council On The Arts, and the Citizens Committee for New York.  In 2020 she was a Finalist for the NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship in the category of Printmaking/Drawing/Book Arts. Most recently, Wasserman was commissioned by the New York City Department of Transportation to create a public art piece.

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STATEMENT

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I paint landscapes as metaphors for life’s challenging journeys—marked by roadblocks, setbacks, loss, and failure. A heroine runs through my work, camouflaged as a road, a mountain, a tree, or a beam of light reflected on water. In painting landscapes, I’m reminded how perspective shapes narrative. I descend into dark, enclosed places with messy, grainy, and uncomfortable textures—but I also rise above. From a bird’s-eye view, the vista blurs, a grid emerges, and the destination feels within reach.

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Originally from Brazil—a land of rainforests, rhythms, and exotic fruits—I spent my childhood in a war-torn region of the Middle East, where harsh sunlight washes out color and only cacti endure beneath the desert sun. My ancestors were expelled and forced to wander with only a bundle of belongings. Inside me live memories of rooting and uprooting, of leaving, losing, and building anew. (Un)belonging has become a mindset.

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I merge landscapes from my past with fractured places from near and far, collecting them like eggs fallen from a nest—mending and blending them into hybrid terrains, filled with diverse climates and species. My process begins with layering and pouring; I work loosely, drawing, scribbling, erasing, and rendering, building up the rich soil of the underpainting. Torn rags and pieces of clothing often appear in the work—symbolizing the human body, its skin, and gestures of mourning and grief.

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Motherhood awakened the Mother within me—an archetype of care, creation, and fierce protection. I see her everywhere: in trees and buds, in mountains and wind, in animals and the earth itself. I paint her in a range of skin tones, embodied in the ground. She is the wanderer and the soil beneath her feet—creator, sustainer, and destroyer. I strive to capture her beauty and generosity, but also her rage in response to exploitation, injustice, corruption, and deceit.

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My paintings hold stories of abandonment, cruelty, and neglect—roads that lead nowhere, tears streaming from trees, crops rising beside submerged homes and upturned roots. Floating eyes drift in water; tear-shaped leaves fall from aching branches. Cloud-like figures reach for anchors but remain fused to the land. In these imagined terrains, tragedy and hope coexist—emotional geographies of displacement, resilience, and transformation.