Wosene Worke Kosrof

Art Brokerage: Wosene Worke Kosrof Ethiopian Artist: b. 1955. Wosene Worke Kosrof is an Ethiopian painter and mixed-media artist. Wosene (his professional name) was awarded his B.F.A. from the School of Fine Arts in Addis Ababa in 1972, and received an M.F.A. from Howard University in 1980. He is best known for his inventive renderings of the Amharic script; and he is the first Ethiopian-born contemporary artist to incorporate these script symbols as a core aesthetic element in fine art paintings. His recognizable "signature" emerges by distorting, elongating, dissecting, and reassembling the symbols as images. Amharic is derived from the ancient language Ge'ez and a major modern language of Ethiopia, is one of the few written systems indigenous to Africa. Wosene likes to examine the relationship between sound and color in art. He says jazz is especially important in his own creative process. Jazz improvisations underlie his compositions, animating them with rhythmic movements and emboldening his masterful use of color. Wosene explained that he does not pre-sketch paintings, "my process is inchoate and exploratory: the interplay of accident and intention, of mastery and uncertainty, of curiosity and discovery. Quick-drying acrylics allow me to easily build and destroy colors and figures on canvas." Listings wanted.