Visiting Artist: Ellen Altfest

Ellen Altfest paints exclusively from observation, describing plants, gourds, and male models in tight, sharply realistic detail. Her idiosyncratic approach to cropping and framing forces all subject matter to be seen from similar vantage points. Born in New York in 1970, Ellen Altfest earned her MFA from Yale University in 1997, and attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 2002. Altfest has completed residencies at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Mass., Yaddo, and the Vermont Studio Center. She has exhibited widely both nationally and internationally, including at the 55th Venice Biennale, the New Museum, White Cube Hoxton Square in London, and in the National Academy Museum’s Annual Exhibition. Altfest lives and works in New York and is represented by White Cube.