Harry Tsuchidana doesn’t look at the downside of things. He continually radiates positivity. He views art in the same way that he views life: It’s all about going with the flow, finding balance and viewing different perspectives.

“We don’t make mistakes. Whatever we do is right in that moment. If you want to change a line, just draw over it,” he said. “Everything always works out.”

That doesn’t mean things will always work out as we expected, but we’re always evolving, he explained. Tsuchidana came to understand the ebb and flow of life after losing his wife, Violet, whom he considered his rock, after 59 years of marriage. She died in April 2017.

“One of the last things that she told me was, ‘Everything will be OK,’” he said. And for Tsuchidana, it is.

Now 86, he continues to create art daily in his Salt Lake studio, adjacent to his apartment. He works full days, starting around 6 a.m., and is completely focused on form, lines, color and composition.

“I get up every day and sketch,” he said. “It’s about the art of creating. It takes seconds to do some things, but it took me 86 years to get to this point.”

When he’s waiting for his paintings to dry, he creates collages or works on other projects.

“I never hit a wall. If I get tired of doing something, I just do something else,” he said. “It’s not talent that keeps you going; it’s drive. I don’t worry about being a successful artist. I focus on becoming a good person. I love to make people laugh.”

TSUCHIDANA’S WORKS spanning more than six decades will be displayed at The Art Gallery at the University of Hawaii-Manoa through Oct. 5, with a talk by the artist and opening reception Sunday.

“Harry Tsuchidana: Works on Paper” features more than 80 drawings and paintings produced over his decades-long career. Nudes, black-and-white pen and pencil drawings, watercolors and crayon works are among the chosen pieces.

Rod Bengston, former UH-Manoa gallery director, selected the works. Through conversations with Tsuchidana, he identified various themes and expressions, many of which Tsuchidana has returned to throughout the decades.

“I’ve been criticized for producing the same thing over and over, but that’s how you evolve,” Tsuchidana said.

The artist grew up in Waipahu on a 2-acre farm. He began tracing comics when he was 8 years old, then began doing portraits of classmates and his teacher.

Later, he captured boxers on the nights of their matches and sketched while hanging out at local pool halls.

“The action fascinated me,” he said. “Lots of my early work was very spontaneous work. That’s more fun to do, but I can’t do it all the time.”

TSUCHIDANA WAS among a cohort that ventured to New York City during the mid-20th century and considers himself part of the international modernist art movement.

Several artists of his generation, also Americans of Japanese ancestry, made their mark on the modernist movement. Many, like Tsuchidana, considered Oahu-born artist Isami Doi (1903-1965), who studied in Hawaii, New York and Paris, a mentor.

“The New York artist motto was: You have everything to gain and nothing to lose,” Tsuchidana said.

After serving in the U.S. Marine Corps from 1952 to 1955, Tsuchidana used the G.I. Bill to attain an art education. He went to Corcoran School of Art in Washington, D.C., and then to the Brooklyn Museum Art School.

He considers his late sister Toshie, who died at age 28 in a car accident, to be his guardian angel. “One night when I was walking alone in D.C., I heard her voice. She’s the one that told me to go to New York City.” He took that advice, not knowing where it would lead.

There, Tsuchidana seriously focused on formal art training and his lifelong career as an artist. After the Brooklyn art school he attended the Pratt Institute School of Art and worked as a night watchman at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, where he was able to view and study the artwork each night.

Tsuchidana was influenced by many artists, but he considers Mondrian to be his “spiritual father,” who taught him about equations and the importance of balance.

His “spiritual mother,” he said, is Arthur Dove, an artist who captured the essence of subjects and nature.

“I’m trying to capture all of those things,” he said. “I learn something from everyone I meet.”

Tsuchidana says he never felt pressured to sell his works. His late wife would simply say, “Have a good show.”

His first solo exhibition was at the Library of Hawaii in 1955. More recently, his work was displayed in “Harry Tsuchidana: A Retrospective” at the Honolulu Museum of Arts’ First Hawaiian Center in 2016, and “Abstract Expressionism: Looking East from the Far West” at the Honolulu Museum in 2017.

At the end of each day, he typically has around 30 finished paintings lying around his studio. “All of the things that I felt that day are on the paper,” he said. “It’s like a musical for the eyes; an orchestration.

“You stop when the feeling is gone. I plan to keep on going. I still have a dream.”