JUDY PFAFF

Judy Pfaff, Five Decades from Ameringer | McEnery | Yohe on Vimeo.

New York, New York - Ameringer | McEnery | Yohe is please to announce an exhibition of works by Judy Pfaff spanning five decades, beginning with the 1970’s. Five Decades will open on Friday, September 10th and remain on view until Saturday, October 16th. A reception for the artist will take place on the evening of September 10th, between 6:00 and 8:00 PM. The public is welcome. “Judy Pfaff first hit her stride in the mid- to late - 1970s, a period of abundant innovation in which artists as diverse as Gordon Matta-Clark, Lynda Benglis, and Richard Tuttle successfully broke through the constraints of minimalism and redefined existing artistic practices. While Pfaff is one of the artists who found a way to challenge the austerities and literalism associated with minimalism and conceptual art, what distinguishes her from her peers is that, of them all, she is the most difficult to categorize. Pfaff is neither painter nor sculptor, but an inclusive artist who uses materials and processes associated with both. She is an artist whose work has ranged from temporary site-specific installations to large, expansive pieces that are permanently attached to a wall. Finally, unlike many artists of the post-minimalist generation, Pfaff has never settled into the use of a particular material or process. One doesn't think of her as working only in fiberglass or bronze, for example. One doesn't even think of her work as falling into a particular period when she worked in a single material or utilized only one process. Instead, she is an artist whose work slips in and out of every category, making such distinctions irrelevant.” An excerpt from the essay Judy Pfaff by John Yau, written for Visions of America: Landscape as Metaphor in the Late Twentieth Century, 1994 and published by The Denver Art Museum and the Columbus Museum of Art. Judy Pfaff was born in London, England in 1946. She received a BFA from Washington University, Saint Louis (1971) and an MFA from Yale University (1973). Pfaff has received many awards, including a John D. and Catherine T. Mac Arthur Foundation Award (2004); a Bessie (1984); and fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (1983) and the National Endowment for the Arts (1986). She has had major exhibitions at the 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). Pfaff represented the United States in the 1998 São Paolo Bienal. Pfaff lives and works in Kingston and Tivoli, New York. Her works are included in the collections of Albright-Knox Art Gallery, The Brooklyn Museum, The Detroit Institute of Arts, The High Museum of Art, the Elvehjem Museum of Art, The Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY