He also is a sculptor, a writer and an Academy Award nominated filmmaker. His monumental paintings exist on many levels, utilizing a layer of materials, sources and subject matter to capture and freeze a larger narrative that resonates a poetic that is beyond the picture plane and exclusive to each viewer. Veering away from the prominent practice of minimalism and conceptual art of the 1970s, Schnabel invented a new version of art through an exploration of sculptural painting. His handling of fragmented material, specifically demonstrated in the now historical Plate Paintings, propelled him into the center of the international art world. In 1980 he was the youngest artist in A New Spirit In Painting show in London, the oldest artist being Pablo Picasso.