At 95, Magdalena Suarez Frimkess gets her first major museum retrospective. 'The work keeps me alive'

For living proof of the determination and persistence required to conquer the art world, consider Magdalena Suarez Frimkess. Her artistic talent, first noted by nuns when she was 9 and living in a Venezuelan orphanage, has brought the painter and sculptor her first major museum retrospective — at age 95. For decades, this force of nature has made a daily ritual of manipulating earth, water and fire to create perfectly imperfect stoneware dishes, bowls, teacups and vases as well as animal and cartoon character figurines.

Using her own made-from-memory glazes and stains, she painstakingly renders an idiosyncratic visual language: flowers, Aztec pictograms, Japanese patterns, classic Popeye and Felix the Cat and Mickey Mouse comics, even one of her recent CVS prescription labels. Her deft brushwork, dazzling sense of color and unpretentious approach transform her humble, charming ceramics into artworks that captivate the eye and engage the heart and mind. “I am very sloppy.

I do it quickly and let it be, and some pieces come out better than others,” declares Suarez Frimkess, who prefers the understatement and deadpan humor of her favorite comic strips to art world pontification. “But doing the work keeps me alive no matter what.” And in a manner fitting the artist, she concludes: “I did OK.

” Already collected by fellow artists Cindy Sherman and Kaws, director Sofia Coppola and music mogul Benny Blanco, and having produced two collaborations with Italian fashion hou.