{{Short description|American painter (born 1954)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=January 2024}} '''Peggy Cyphers''' (born 1954) is an American painter, printmaker, professor, curator, and art writer. Cyphers was a formative figure in the East Village art scene during the 1980s, and has had her work exhibited in the United States and Europe since then.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=Carey |first=Brainard |date=2015-09-04 |title=Peggy Cyphers |url=https://museumofnonvisibleart.com/interviews/peggy-cyphers/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=Interviews from Yale University Radio WYBCX |language=en}}</ref>
== Biography == Cyphers grew up in Baltimore and Chesapeake Beach, Maryland and has been inspired by the Miocene fossil deposits, Calvert Cliffs and aquatic life of the Bay since childhood.{{Citation needed|date=January 2025}} She received her BFA from Towson University<ref name=":1">{{Cite web |last=Kirkman |first=Rebecca |date=13 October 2022 |title=Highest alumni recognition awards return Homecoming week |url=https://alumni.towson.edu/s/news/a3C4u000008jeBMEAY/highest-alumni-recognition-awards-return-homecoming-week |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240214011803/https://alumni.towson.edu/s/news/a3C4u000008jeBMEAY/highest-alumni-recognition-awards-return-homecoming-week |archive-date=February 14, 2024 |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=alumni.towson.edu |language=en-US |url-status=live }}</ref> and also attended the Maryland Institute College of Art.<ref name=":0" />
Upon moving to New York in 1977, she studied painting at the Pratt Institute and received an MFA with a Ford Foundation Award.<ref name=":0" /> Cyphers became a part of the East Village art scene in the 1980s,<ref>{{Cite web |date=19 March 2015 |title=The Late Child Arrives |url=https://www.bmcc.cuny.edu/news/the-late-child-arrives/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=BMCC News |language=en-US}}</ref> and exhibited her first major series of work “Modern Fossils.”<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |last=Cohen |first=Ronny |date=1985-02-09 |title=Peggy Cyphers |url=https://www.artforum.com/events/peggy-cyphers-2-224551/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=Artforum |language=en-US}}</ref>
Cyphers is a tenured adjunct professor of painting at the Pratt Institute.<ref>{{cite web |title=Peggy Cyphers |url=https://www.pratt.edu/people/peggy-cyphers/ |website=Pratt University Staff Profile - Peggy Cyphers}}</ref> At Pratt, her former students include Mickalene Thomas. Cyphers mentored Thomas and encouraged her to apply to graduate school at Yale University.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Millman |first=Debbie |date=2023-06-26 |title=Best of Design Matters: Mickalene Thomas |url=https://www.printmag.com/podcasts/2023/best-of-design-matters-mickalene-thomas/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=PRINT Magazine |language=en-US}}</ref> She has also taught at New York University; Parsons; University of North Carolina, Greensboro; Royal Academy of Art Helsinki; Lahti Polytechnic Institute, Lahti, Finland; School of Visual Arts; and New York School of Interior Design. She has taught in the Pratt in Venice and Tuscany Programs.
Since 1988, Cyphers’ critical writings have appeared in such publications as ''Painters on Paintings'',<ref>{{cite web |last=Cyphers |first=Peggy |date=June 9, 2014 |title=Peggy Cyphers on Francisco de Goya |url=http://paintersonpaintings.com/2014/06/09/peggy-cyphers-on-francisco-de-goya/}}</ref> ''Art Journal'', ''Arts Magazine'', ''Tema Celeste'', ''A Gathering of the Tribes'',<ref>{{cite web |last=Cyphers |first=Peggy |date=August 11, 2008 |title="Goose-bumps": Louise Bourgeois at the Guggenheim Museum in New York |url=http://www.tribes.org/web/2008/08/11/goose-bumps-louise-bourgeois-at-the-guggenheim-museum-in-new-york-by-peggy-cyphers/}}</ref> ''New Observations'',<ref>{{cite web |last=Cyphers |first=Peggy |title=Review |url=http://newobs.org/backissues}}</ref> ''Cover'', The Thing.net,<ref>{{cite web |last=Cyphers |first=Peggy |title=Peggy Cyphers's Blog |url=http://post.thing.net/blog/172}}</ref> and Resolve40, as well as catalog essays for museums and galleries.
Cyphers has been a resident artist at Tong Xian Art Residency, Beijing, Santa Fe Art Institute, International Studio Program NYC,<ref>{{cite web |title=Alumni Map |url=http://www.iscp-nyc.org/artists/alumni-map.html}}</ref> ArtOmi,<ref>{{cite web |title=Past Residents |url=http://artomi.org/program.php?Art-Omi-5 |website=Art Omi}}</ref> Yaddo<ref>{{cite web |title=Yaddo Guests: Visual Artists |url=http://yaddo.org/yaddo/artistslists.shtml |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150520050934/http://yaddo.org/yaddo/artistslists.shtml |archive-date=2015-05-20 |access-date=2015-05-14}}</ref> and Triangle Artists Workshop.<ref>{{cite web |title=1992 Workshop |url=http://triangleworkshop.org/workshop/1992-workshop/ |website=Triangle Workshop}}</ref>
In addition to showing her own art, Cyphers has curated exhibitions at Exit Art,<ref>{{cite web |last=McClemont |first=Doug |date=February 2011 |title=Reviews |url=http://www.exitart.org/assets/files/press/press_reviews/Fracking_ArtNews.pdf}}</ref> Solo Impressions, and Creon, among other venues.{{Citation needed|date=January 2025}}
== Artwork == Roberta Smith writing in ''The New York Times'', said that Cyphers paints "in an effortless style that corrupts and complicates the staining technique originated by Color Field painters like Helen Frankenthaler with various ideas in the air: notational, pattern-prone motifs, landscape references and allusions to textiles and fabric. The plants are still here, but now they are usually soft blooms and plumes of color that also suggest, with a little help from the titles, wet pavement, blurry stop lights or even the Brooklyn Bridge."<ref>{{cite news |last=Smith |first=Roberta |date=May 16, 2003 |title=Art in Review |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/16/arts/art-in-review-peggy-cyphers.html |newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref>
Some of Cyphers’ notable series of paintings and works on paper include:
'''"Lexicons of Paradise"'''
Influenced by Darwinian evolutionary theory, Cyphers created a series of naturalistic themed paintings called "Lexicons of Paradise" in the early 1990's. These paintings explore human nature through painterly vignettes. Each painting has a portion of its surface covered by diamond dust.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Zimmer |first=William |date=1993-10-03 |title=ART: Primal Nature and the Celebrating of a 'Joyful Spirit' |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/10/03/nyregion/art-primal-nature-and-the-celebrating-of-a-joyful-spirit.html?unlocked_article_code=1.tU4.t2d4.NGzbpDBqpQOC&smid=url-share |access-date=2025-02-03 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>
'''“Animal Spirits”'''
After extensive travel, which included a residence at the Tong Xian Arts Center in Beijing, China, Cyphers completed a series of paintings reflecting the relationship between sentient creatures and geological or natural phenomena. These paintings draw from scientific and cultural references, such as Pliny’s Natural History, Chinese landscape paintings, and Native American traditions,<ref name=":3" /> which she expressed through gestural brushwork and the use of natural, textured materials like sand and gold.<ref>{{Cite web |last= |date=2013-06-11 |title=Peggy Cyphers |url=https://www.artnews.com/art-in-america/features/peggy-cyphers-56639/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=ARTnews.com |language=en-US}}</ref>
'''"Prairie Conversation"'''
During a residency at the Grin City Collective in Grinnell, Iowa, in the spring of 2013, Cyphers began a project titled “Prairie Conversation,” a series of prints about the hundreds of plant species found in Iowa’s prairie, researched using the specimens and extensive archive at Grinnell College’s herbarium.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Steacy |first=Fiona |date=2014-11-17 |title=Forces of Nature |url=https://hudsonvalleyone.com/2014/11/17/forces-nature/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=Hudson Valley One |language=en-US}}</ref>
'''“Future Byzantium”'''
Cyphers’ interpretation of Byzantine mosaics is reflected in a series of gold-toned paintings she made with quasi-religious light that evokes the aesthetic of the early Italian Renaissance.<ref name=":4">{{Cite web |last=Cohen |first=Ronny |date=1996-06-01 |title=Peggy Cyphers |url=https://www.artforum.com/events/peggy-cyphers-212232/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=Artforum |language=en-US}}</ref>
== Exhibitions == Cyphers’ work has been exhibited in 30 solo exhibitions and over 180 group exhibitions.<ref name=":0" /> Cyphers is represented by Front Room Gallery in Hudson, New York.<ref name=":5">{{Cite web |last=Yaniv |first=Etty |date=2024-05-05 |title=Peggy Cyphers: Passages at The Front Room |url=https://artspiel.org/peggy-cyphers-passages-at-the-front-room/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=Art Spiel |language=en-US}}</ref> Her most recent show in 2024 was at the Front Room Gallery in Hudson, titled ''Passages''. The exhibition was reviewed in Whitehot Magazine<ref>{{Cite web |last=Goodman |first=Jonathan |date=23 May 2024 |title=Peggy Cyphers at the Front Room Gallery (Hudson, New York) |url=https://whitehotmagazine.com/articles/gallery-hudson-new-york-/6373 |access-date=2025-01-22 |website=Whitehot Magazine of Contemporary Art |language=en}}</ref> and Art Spiel.<ref name=":5" />
Notable venues that have exhibited her work include the Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY)<ref>{{Cite web |title=Peggy Cyphers {{!}} MoMA |url=https://www.moma.org/artists/70816-peggy-cyphers |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=The Museum of Modern Art |language=en}}</ref> E. M. Donahue Gallery (New York, NY),<ref name=":4" /> Cross Contemporary Art,<ref>[https://www.crosscontemporaryart.com/peggy-cyphers-solo-show-2/ Peggy Cyphers: Modern Fossils] crosscontemporaryart.com</ref> Noma Gallery (San Francisco, CA),<ref>{{cite web |title=Peggy Cyphers |url=http://www.nomagallerysf.com/artists/PeggyCyphers/index.html}}</ref> New York Academy of Sciences (New York, NY), Rhode Island College (Providence, RI), William Patterson College (Wayne, NJ),<ref>{{Cite news |last=Schwabsky |first=Barry |date=1996-09-22 |title=Three Painters Add a Human Touch to Abstraction |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/22/nyregion/three-painters-add-a-human-touch-to-abstraction.html?unlocked_article_code=1.tU4.piOO.mJIzMdvH4wIE&smid=url-share |access-date=2025-02-03 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}</ref> Galerie Asbeck (Copenhagen), Haines Gallery (San Francisco, CA), Betsy Rosenfield (Chicago, IL), M13 (New York, NY), Limbo Gallery, Ground Zero Gallery (New York, NY), the Proposition (New York, NY), Kleinert James Art Center (Woodstock, NY), Creon Gallery (New York, NY),<ref>{{cite web |title=Artists |url=http://www.creongallery.com}}</ref> Mincher Wilcox (San Francisco, CA), and Art Gallery at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa (Honolulu, HI).<ref>{{Cite web |last= |date=2015-05-20 |title=NEW NEW YORK: ABSTRACT PAINTING IN THE 21ST CENTURY |url=https://hawaii.edu/art/new-new-york-abstract-painting-in-the-21st-century/ |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=Department of Art and Art History: University of Hawaii at Manoa |language=en-US}}</ref>
Her first one-person show, titled ''Modern Fossils'', was held at M13 Gallery in 1984.<ref name=":2" />
Cyphers’ 1987 exhibition, ''Natural Selection'' at Ground Zero Gallery featured paintings like ''Origin of Species'', which symbolically visualize Charles Darwin’s naturalist writing and research.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Smith |first=Roberta |date=1987-02-13 |title=ART: IN BLECKNER SHOW, AN ARRAY OF PAST MOTIFS |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1987/02/13/arts/art-in-bleckner-show-an-array-of-past-motifs.html?unlocked_article_code=1.tU4.KLRJ.cHjhMt0YiU9l&smid=url-share |access-date=2025-02-03 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>
Cyphers’ exhibitions have received numerous reviews from art critics in publications including ''Artforum'', ''New Criterion'',<ref>{{cite web |last=Perl |first=Jed |date=March 1989 |title=Autumn Alphabet |url=http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Autumn-alphabet-5871}}</ref> ''Vogue'', the ''San Francisco Chronicle'' and the ''Chicago Tribune.''
Art writer Demetria Daniels said to Artnet editor Walter Robinson about the works in Cypher's 2003 solo exhibition at the Proposition that "they're warm and loving".<ref>{{cite web |author=Walter Robinson |title=Weekend Update |url=http://www.artnet.com/magazine/reviews/robinson/robinson4-14-03.asp |access-date=15 January 2024 |website=artnet.com Magazine Reviews}}</ref>
Her 2012 New York exhibition ''Animal Spirits'' at The Proposition Gallery<ref>{{cite web |title=Peggy Cyphers |url=http://www.theproposition.com/artist-profiles/peggy-cyphers/}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |date=December 2, 2012 |title=Peggy Cyphers in Art in America The Lookout |url=http://www.theproposition.com/news/peggy-cyphers-in-art-in-america-the-lookout/}}</ref> was reviewed in ''Art in America'', and ''The Brooklyn Rail''.<ref>{{cite web |last=Edelman |first=Robert |date=February 14, 2012 |title=Peggy Cyphers: A Studio Conversation with Robert G. Edelman |url=http://www.arterynyc.com/posts/peggy-cyphers-a-studio-conversation-with-robert-g-edelman/}}</ref> Jonathan Goodman wrote in ''The Brooklyn Rail'' that, "Peggy Cyphers has put on a show of startling originality at the Proposition, located nearby the New Museum on the Lower East Side. The artist, who has more than three decades of experience living and working in New York, calls the exhibition Animal Spirits, in reference to the creatures symbolized by feathers or fur or claws in her compositions."<ref name=":3">{{cite web |last=Goodman |first=Jonathan |date=February 5, 2013 |title=Animal Spirits |url=http://www.brooklynrail.org/2013/02/artseen/peggy-cyphers-animal-spirits |website=The Brooklyn Rail}}</ref>
== Awards and accolades == Cyphers has been awarded numerous grants and honors for her paintings. In 2022, Cyphers was awarded the Distinguished Alumni Award from Towson University.<ref name=":1" /> She has also received the Peter S. Reed Foundation Grant (2011),<ref>{{cite web |title=List of Individual grant recipients by year |url=http://www.petersreedfoundation.com/peters.reed2011.html |website=Peter S. Reed Foundation}}</ref> Pratt Institute Faculty Fund Award (2011, 2001),<ref name=":0" /> Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (1997),<ref>{{cite web|url = http://www.efanyc.org/search?q=Peggy%20Cyphers|title = Artist News: Peggy Cyphers|date = November 7, 2014}}</ref> National Studio Award, PS.1 Clocktower (1991),<ref>{{cite web |title=National and International Studio Program Participants |url=http://www.moma.org/learn/resources/archives/ps1_studioprogram |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20161013144743/http://www.moma.org/learn/resources/archives/ps1_studioprogram |archivedate=2016-10-13 |website=MoMA PS1 Studio Program}}</ref> National Endowment for the Arts Award in Painting (1989)<ref name=":1" /> and the Igor Foundation Award (1987).
== Museum holdings and collections == Cyphers’ artworks are in the following public collections: the Columbia Museum of Art (Columbia, SC),<ref>{{Cite web |date=2009 |title=Columbia Museum of Art in Columbia, SC, Offers Works from The Dorothy and Herbert Vogel Collection |url=https://carolinaarts.com/1009columbiamoa.html |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=carolinaarts.com}}</ref> Cedar Rapids Museum of Art (Cedar Rapids, IA),<ref name=":6">{{Cite web |title=Vogel 50x50: Peggy Cyphers |url=https://www.vogel5050.org/artists/34?nav=collection&navmode=filters&filterpage=1&reset=1&navsub=institutions |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=www.vogel5050.org}}</ref> University Museum, Southern Illinois University (Carbondale, IL),<ref>{{Cite web |title=New York collectors donate art to SIUC's museum |url=https://news.siu.edu/2008/10/100808amh8187.php |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=SIU News}}</ref> Seattle Art Museum (Seattle, WA),<ref>{{Cite web |title=Works – eMuseum |url=https://art.seattleartmuseum.org/objects/images;jsessionid=D2F63D3B482430B0A9CA0CDF961830FC?filter=department:Modern%20and%20Contemporary%20Art&page=56 |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=art.seattleartmuseum.org}}</ref> among other national arts institutions. Cyphers’ had several paintings in Herbert and Dorothy Vogel’s noted contemporary art collection.<ref>{{Cite web |last= |first= |date=2009-12-16 |title=Modern Collection Sprung from Modest Means |url=https://www.postandcourier.com/free-times/archives/modern-collection-sprung-from-modest-means/article_70c35e84-5722-5940-89fd-3e2bd65befa6.html |access-date=2025-02-03 |website=Post and Courier |language=en}}</ref> In 2008, the Vogel’s launched ''The Dorothy and Herbert Vogel Collection: Fifty Works for Fifty States'', which placed four of Cyphers’ paintings (''Galaxy's Empire'', ''Last Look'', ''Natural Love'', and ''Psyche’s World'') in museum collections across the United States.<ref name=":6" />
== References == {{Reflist}} <ref>{{Cite web |url=http://vanderplasgallery.com/peggy-cyphers/ |title=Peggy Cyphers « van der Plas Gallery |access-date=2015-05-14 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150518092358/http://vanderplasgallery.com/peggy-cyphers/ |archive-date=2015-05-18 |url-status=dead }}</ref> <ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.crosscontemporaryart.com/artists/peggy-cyphers/|title = Peggy Cyphers}}</ref> <ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.bauinstitute.org/artists/peggy_cyphers.html|title=Peggy Cyphers|website=www.bauinstitute.org|accessdate=15 January 2024}}</ref> <ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.aptglobal.org/en/Artists/Page/8364/Peggy-Cyphers-Peggy-Cyphers|title = Peggy Cyphers Peggy Cyphers}}</ref> <ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.neoimages.net/artistportfolio.aspx?pid=2997|title=Broad Thinking | NYC BRIDGE ART FAIR '09|website=www.neoimages.net|accessdate=15 January 2024}}</ref>
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Cyphers, Peggy}} Category:1954 births Category:Living people Category:20th-century American painters Category:21st-century American painters Category:Pratt Institute alumni Category:Pratt Institute faculty Category:20th-century American women painters Category:21st-century American women painters Category:American women academics