An artist working in the field of video, photography, installation art and sculpture since the late nineties, Paul Pfeiffer is well known and celebrated for his highly sophisticated use of digital technologies and new media, probing the way these technologies at once shape and alter our daily visual experience. By digitally manipulating or erasing elements from iconic images, many of them taken from sports events or Hollywood films, Pfeiffer adopts today’s frenetic visual language in order to explore our culture’s obsession with spectacle. By focusing on how the contemporary image-making and circulation tends to render people as objects rather than subjects, Pfeiffer stages the `otherness´ of the image through an artistic investigation that examines, resists, and exploits spectacle by honing in on and isolating representational codes that otherwise tend to enthral the viewer.
He has received numerous awards and fellowships including a Fulbright-Hayes Fellowship and the Bucksbaum Award from the Whitney Museum. In November 2023 his first US retrospective opened at the The Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Los Angeles. Selected exhibitions include the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Nottingham Contemporary, Nottingham UK; Haus der Kunst, Munich, Germany; MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge US; Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Chicago; the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; MUSAC León, León; Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin; Baibakov Art Projects, Moscow; Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo; Blanton Museum of Art, Austin; Artangel, London; Museum of Contemporary Art and Design, Manila. His work is held in international collections including LACMA, Los Angeles; Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin; Pinault Collection, Paris; Castello di Rivoli, Turin; Sammlung Goetz, Munich and MoMA, New York.
Selected Works
Paul Pfeiffer
Vitruvian Figure (After Raphael), 1998
digitally generated sepia print on mylar
182,9 × 91,4 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Vitruvian Figure, 2015
Plywood, mirror
242 × 960 × 498 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Vitruvian Figure (After Pavia Cathedral), 1998
digitally generated sepia print on mylar
182,9 × 91,4 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Justin Bieber Torso (Tlaxcala), 2024
from the series “Incarnator”
cedar wood, paint
49 × 47 × 21 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Brunette/Temple of Solomon (After Villalpando), 1998
c-print on aluminum
121,9 × 121,9 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Ebony/Temple of Solomon (After Villalpando), 1998
c-print on aluminum
121,4 × 121,4 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Blonde/Temple of Solomon (After Villalpando), 1998
c-print on aluminum
121,9 × 121,9 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Josmel, 2018
from the series “Incarnator”
3D print duplicated in Balayong wood
32 × 22 × 16,5 cm
Paul Pfeiffer
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (17), 2004
matte c-print
182,88 × 146,3 cm
ed. 3 + 2 AP
Paul Pfeiffer
Live Evil (Gothenburg), 2003 / 2017
Digital video loop, 2.5” LCD screen in custom 3D printed , painted, resin shell, SD Card
loop
ed. 3 + 1 AP
Paul Pfeiffer
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (24), 2006
matte c-print
182,88 × 146,3 cm
ed. 3 + 2 AP
c|g Exhibitions
Revelation 21 | Berlin
13.09.–16.11.2024
Under the Influence of the Ellipse | Berlin
28.01.–15.04.2023
Incarnator | Madrid
10.09.–30.10.2021
So what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing? | Madrid
27.02.–01.03.2020
Incarnator | Berlin
16.03.–18.04.2019
The Extended Moment | Berlin
14.01.–04.03.2017
Three Figures in a Room | Berlin
30.03.–23.04.2016
Paul Pfeiffer | Berlin
06.09.–11.10.2008
Pirate Jenny | Berlin
08.03.–16.04.2005
Morning after the Deluge | Berlin
11.11.–20.12.2003
External Exhibitions
Solo Exhibition
Ensemble | Palazzo Grassi, Venice
17.03.2024–06.01.2025
Solo Exhibition
Prologue to the Story of the Birth of Freedom | The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
12.11.2023–16.06.2024
Special Presentation
Still Life | International Center of Photography, New York
28.01.–25.07.2023
Solo Exhibition
Vitruvian Experiments | Galeria Praça, Instituto Inhotim, Brumadinho
Solo Exhibition
Incarnator | Bellas Artes Outpost, Manila, Philippines
07.07.–06.10.2018
Group Exhibition
A beast, a god, and a line in Warsaw | Para Site, Hong Kong
01.03.–31.05.2018
Solo Exhibition
Vitruvian Figure | Museum of Contemporary Art and Design (MCAD), Manila
06.02.–16.04.2015
Solo Exhibition
The Saints | Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin
10.10.2009–02.05.2010
Group Exhibition
Vitruvian Figure | 16th Biennale of Sydney
18.06.–07.09.2008
