SammCohen.com

"If you've never swooned or felt longing, sworn at the sky or tasted feverish delirium, you'd be disadvantaged for viewing Samm Cohen's art. As it is, Miss Cohen draws you to her works whether you're ready or not; instinctively tapping primal chords with savage, last-dream hues, strokes of near abandon. Her figures in her paintings (acrylics and mixed-media on canvas and mirrored glass) waver before us, like moments of intensity we thought we'd forgotten, their empty eyes filled, ever so briefly, with the observer's disoriented wonder. It is in those impassioned few seconds that we get the wordless meanings, complete with all the spittle, tears, torn hair and smeared make-up. And yet we were even fortunate enough to be able to reveal and exhibit a seldom-seen aspect of Miss Cohen's work, that being the written poetry loosely connected to and physically hidden behind the paintings. Pure image and emotion, intellectual note-taking and nervous ramblings, the poems, like the paintings, are heady potions. A prolific artist and a veteran of New York's Diamond District, Miss Cohen also exhibited several unique pieces of sterling silver jewelry (earrings, necklaces and rings) which are a whole world unto themselves. As if forged by a pixie of the mischievous brand, they are works of a young master with a strong grasp of aesthetics which she quite often enjoys subverting. As with any exciting new experience, one walks away from Miss Cohen's art slightly dumbfounded and disheveled, but pleasantly so. And wanting more."

- Charley, for Dusk's Gallery, 12/ 01