Judy Pfaff

In 2013 she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Video interviews and profiles of the artist can be found on the PBS series Art21: Art in the 21st Century and at institutions including Miles McEnery Gallery, MoMa, and Mount Holyoke College Art Museum.

Judy Pfaff studied at Cass Technical High School, Washington University in St. Employment is recorded with Bard College. Work by Judy Pfaff is recorded in the collections of Museum of Modern Art, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Hessel Museum of Art, Print Collection and Bryn Mawr College Special Collections. Distinctions recorded are MacArthur Fellows Program, Rome Prize, Anonymous Was A Woman Award and Guggenheim Fellowship.

• Name — Judy Pfaff • Born — 1946 • Birthplace — London • Education — Cass Technical High School • Alma Mater — Washington University in St. Louis, Yale University • Style — Installation art • Awards — MacArthur Fellow

Pfaff was born in London in 1946. Her father, a Royal Air Force pilot, was absent from her life. Pfaff's mother moved to Detroit soon after Pfaff's birth, leaving Pfaff and her brother to be raised by their grandparents. Post-war London was bleak; Pfaff has described playing in bombed out and abandoned buildings, gathering "raw materials for fantasy buildings." A reunion in 1956 with her mother in Detroit, where she attended Cass Technical High School, did not end well. At age 15, Pfaff left home and eventually married a U.S. Air Force officer. She attended Wayne State University and Southern Illinois University, completing a BFA at Washington University in 1971. Pfaff enrolled in the MFA program at Yale University School of Art, where she embraced the use of heavy equipment and outsized materials. Other disciplines, such as physics, medicine, zoology and astronomy, also influenced her work. At Yale, Pfaff studied with Al Held, who became her mentor. With Held's encouragement, she created an installation for her final project. She completed her MFA in 1973 and then moved to New York City.

Since the 70s, Pfaff has helped redefine contemporary notions of sculpture and has been recognized for her innovative approach to space. While others at the time subscribed to minimalist art forms, Pfaff began making colorful, visually active environments that encompassed an entire gallery and complicated the relationship between sculpture and the architecture that contained it. Spanning across mediums such as painting, printmaking, sculpture and installation, it can be described as "painting in space". Pfaff draws upon spiritual, botanical, and art historical imagery, and "explores issues of creativity and the complexity of life by using strings, vines, spheres, and other objects arranged in a seemingly haphazard way". Although, Pfaff has so far refused to give narrative meaning to her work, which shows an "urgent and ferocious need to labor for the visual and tactile […] in an era where language dominates artistic activity". Pfaff incorporates a range of everyday and industrial materials into her installations such as wire, plastic tubing, fabric, steel, fiberglass, and plaster as well as salvaged signage and tree roots. Her interest in natural motifs extends to a series of prints integrating vegetation, maps, and medical illustrations. She has also used her dramatic sculptural abilities to make set designs for several theatrical stage productions. In recent years, she has incorporated photographic and digital imagery into her installations and prints.

In New York, Pfaff created her first large-scale installation piece, J.A.S.O.N--J.A.S.O.N., at the nonprofit Artists Space in 1975. Pfaff describes her site-specific installations as abstract narratives based on personal experiences. Art critic Benjamin Genocchio commented that Pfaff's installation work can seem disordered, but with a closer look an order seems to reveal itself. In 2006, Pfaff's Buckets of Rain was exhibited at the Ameringer & Yohe Fine Art gallery in New York. An exhibit that was dedicated to Al Held, and Pfaff's mother who passed. This exhibit though was a prime example of how Pfaff continued to work toward incorporating painting into her sculptures. Although, unlike past paintings Pfaff wanted to bring out the three-dimensional aspect. Pfaff effortlessly uses the expansion of her work into space in a way that simultaneously evokes drawing, painting, and sculpture while making reference to both "high" art and popular culture. This and her use of unusual materials like: paper, encaustic, burned foil, massive tree roots, fluorescent lights, glass drops, and many more are key facets to Judy Pfaff's take on sculpture. Pfaff's installation art demonstrates her aesthetical preferences and communicates varying emotions no matter the size or complexity. Each of her installations connects directly to her life experiences. Judy Pfaff throughout all her site-specific installations demonstrates her perseverance in implementing her creativity no matter the setting or challenge. This especially is shown in her If I Had a Boat installation where she had to work around the limitations of how the building was structured. Pfaff's installation work has influenced other artists, including Jessica Stockholder and Sarah Sze.

In addition to her installations, Pfaff creates paintings, sculpture, and prints. "I've always done prints and drawings," Pfaff says. "If you get an installation of mine, you inherit [my assistant] Ryan, myself, a crew, the dog, the noise, the dirt. We wreck the house. So if you don't want that, then you get prints and drawings." Pfaff has also done scenic design. In 2010 Ameringer/McEnery/Yoke showed a retrospective from her oeuvre ranging from the late 1970s to recent work. In a review in The Brooklyn Rail, Kara L. Rooney wrote of the survey's cohesion, "somehow, Pfaff's eclectic interpretation of '80s flamboyance, '90s insecurity, and the aughts' incessant optimism succeeds."

During her prolific career, Pfaff has mounted over 100 solo exhibitions and installations in galleries and museums worldwide. She has had major exhibitions at Elvehjem Museum of Art, University of Wisconsin, Madison (2002); Denver Art Museum (1994); St. Louis Art Museum (1989); and Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo (1982). Her work is also included in the permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, Tate Gallery, Brooklyn Museum of Art, and Detroit Institute of Arts, among others. Furthermore, she represented the United States in the 1998 Bienal de São Paulo. Pfaff's work is not restricted to Installation Art pieces. Her other notable works include Botanica, a mixed media on paper piece owned by the Orlando Museum of Art and Imperial Hotel, a relief print using the intaglio technique owned by the Tampa Museum of Art.

Pfaff is the Richard B. Fisher Professor in the Arts and co-director of the studio arts program at Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. She continues to produce work for sale and for exhibition, including installations and prints. She currently lives and works in Tivoli, NY.

Judy Pfaff is recorded as having received MacArthur Fellows Program, Rome Prize and Anonymous Was A Woman Award.

Judy Pfaff is recorded as having studied at Cass Technical High School, Washington University in St. Louis and Yale School of Art. Born in 1946 at London.