Marcia Jean Hafif (née Woods; August 15, 1929 – April 17, 2018) was an American painter born in

Pomona, California Pomona is a city in Los Angeles County, California. Pomona is located in the Pomona Valley, between the Inland Empire and the San Gabriel Valley. At the 2020 census, the city's population was 151,713. The main campus of California State Polyte ...

Life and career

Hafif was born on August 15, 1929 in Pomona, California. After graduating from

Pomona College Pomona College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Claremont, California. It was established in 1887 by a group of Congregationalists who wanted to recreate a "college of the New England type" in Southern California. In 1925, it became ...

in 1951, Hafif married and worked as a third-grade teacher. In the late 50s, she divorced her husband and began doing graduate work in

Italian Renaissance The Italian Renaissance ( it, Rinascimento ) was a period in Italian history covering the 15th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Europe and marked the trans ...

and Far Eastern Art at Claremont Graduate School. In the summer of 1960, Hafif took a class with Richards Ruben, through whom she met

Walter Hopps Walter "Chico" Hopps (May 3, 1932 – March 20, 2005) was an American museum director, gallerist, and curator of contemporary art. Hopps helped bring Los Angeles post-war artists to prominence during the 1960s, and later went on to redefine pract ...

and various artists showing at

Ferus Gallery The Ferus Gallery was a contemporary art gallery which operated from 1957 to 1966. In 1957, the gallery was located at 736-A North La Cienega Boulevard, Los Angeles, California. In 1958, it was relocated across the street to 723 North La Cienega ...

in Los Angeles. In 1961 Hafif traveled to Italy, planning to spend a year in Florence. Passing through Rome, Hafif was drawn to the atmosphere of the city, remaining there for almost eight years. Returning to California in 1969, Hafif entered the first MFA class at the

University of California at Irvine The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a public land-grant research university in Irvine, California. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, UCI offers 87 undergraduate degrees and 129 graduate and pr ...

. She temporarily left painting to experiment in photography, film, sound, text, and installation. In 1970 Hafif began working on ''Notes on Bob and Nancy'' (1970-1977), an hour-long film featuring fellow UCI graduate students Nancy Buchanan and Robert Walker. Hafif's MFA thesis exhibition, ''U.C.I. Gallery, Irvine, CA 1971'' (1971) featured 12 black and white photographs that depicted details of the gallery space in which they were displayed. This exhibition revealed an interest in "doing something that refers back to itself." In 1971, Hafif moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

to search out a return to painting at a time when the validity of painting was in doubt. She awoke on the morning of January 1, 1972, to make her first pencil on paper drawing. Starting in the upper left corner, Hafif covered the page across and down with short vertical marks. As she shifted back into painting, Hafif continued in this mode, methodically covering her canvases with short vertical marks of paint. Over the course of one year, Hafif developed a painting series that transitioned from white to black. ''An Extended Gray Scale'' (1972–73) came to encompass 106 oil paintings, each 22 x 22 inches. Each canvas was painted in a different tone of gray, determined by Hafif's ability to visually distinguish a difference in tone to the canvas preceding it. Exhibiting for more than eight years with

Sonnabend Gallery Ileana Sonnabend (née Schapira, October 29, 1914 – October 21, 2007) was a Romanian-American art dealer of 20th-century art. The Sonnabend Gallery opened in Paris in 1962 and was instrumental in making American art of the 1960s known in Europe, ...

in Soho and Paris, she developed series of paintings that would become the basis of what came to be called The Inventory: 1974, Mass Tone Paintings; 1975, Wall Paintings; 1976, Pencil Drawings; 1978, Neutral Mix Paintings; 1979, Broken Color Paintings at The Clocktower with

Alanna Heiss Alanna Heiss (born May 13, 1943, in Louisville, Kentucky) is the Founder and Director of Clocktower Productions, a non profit arts organization, online radio station, and program partnership with six cultural institutions in three boroughs in Ne ...

; 1981, Black Paintings. During this time she also published articles on painting in

Artforum ''Artforum'' is an international monthly magazine specializing in contemporary art. The magazine is distinguished from other magazines by its unique 10½ x 10½ inch square format, with each cover often devoted to the work of an artist. Notabl ...

: “Beginning Again” in 1978, and in

Art in America ''Art in America'' is an illustrated monthly, international magazine concentrating on the contemporary art world in the United States, including profiles of artists and genres, updates about art movements, show reviews and event schedules. It i ...

: “Getting on With Painting,” 1981, and “True Colors,” in 1989. In the 1980s and 1990s, she developed new series, along with relationships with galleries in Europe, first in Munich, then Düsseldorf, and eventually Vienna, London, Paris, and elsewhere. Living part-time in California after 1999 still other series of paintings have appeared, most recently the Shade Paintings. Hafif died on April 17, 2018 at the age of 88.

Exhibitions

*2018 **"Marcia Hafif: A Place Apart",

Pomona College Museum of Art The Benton Museum of Art at Pomona College, known colloquially as the Benton, is an art museum at Pomona College in Claremont, California. It was completed in 2020, replacing the Montgomery Art Gallery which had been home to the Pomona College ...

, September 4 - December 22, 2018 **"Marcia Hafif: Films (1970–1999)", Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus und Kunstbau, Munich, July 17- September 30, 2018 *2010 - "From the Inventory: Black Paintings, 1979-1980", Newman Popiashvili Gallery *2012 - "Marcia Hafif: From the Inventory – Late Roman Paintings", Larry Becker Contemporary Art, May 5 – July 7, 2012 *2015 - "Marcia Hafif: From the Inventory", Laguna Art Museum, June 28 – September 27, 2015 * 1969 - "Marcia Hafif. New Paintings", Roma, Galleria Editalia Qui arte contemporanea.

Collections

Hafif's work is held in collections worldwide including The Museum of Modern Art, New York.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hafif, Marcia 1929 births 2018 deaths People from Pomona, California American women painters 20th-century American women artists 20th-century American painters 21st-century American women artists 21st-century American painters Painters from California Pomona College alumni University of California, Irvine alumni