By the mid-'50s, Julius Wasserstein already had spent three years at CSFA (now the San Francisco Art Institute), and he was studying at San Francisco State University building a reputation as an action painter. He was, along with Remington, who shared his interest in action techniques, one of the three artists who showed at both the Ubu and the "6" Galleries. Much of Wasserstein's work in the early '50s employs big, fuzzy forms in which paint is often exploited as a material capable of a whole range of characteristics and techniques. He returned to the San Francisco Art Institute to teach, from 1960 to 1963, and during that time received the San Francisco Art Association Nellie Sullivan Award (1961). Later, in the '60s and '70s, Wasserstein's style changed, as small, vivid forms were set against larger areas of dark, even color. "His paintings of the 1960s and 1970s became more spare, concentrating on small, irregular areas or expansive ribbons of vivid, marbled colors against grounds of flat, darker colors".

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