10/01/2026
The UAM remembers Rafael Ferrer (1933–2026), the Puerto Rican-born artist who defied categorization as he moved among painting, performance, installation, and other media. Ferrer’s ever-evolving creative impulses were rooted in his background as a drummer of Afro-Cuban music and jazz. As he told The Brooklyn Rail in 2013: “My earlier life as a musician created in my psyche a sense that what you do is dictated by the needs of the moment, all within a repertoire.”
This repertoire included printmaking, and Ferrer created this untitled carborundum print for The Atelier Project—16 prints made between 1979-86 by leading artists of the day through student-engaged workshops at SUNY Purchase. On permanent view in the UAM’s Collections Study Space, this print continues to engage our students, visitors, and the next generation of artists.
Ferrer’s innovations earned him international renown. In addition to his solo exhibitions at institutions including El Museo del Barrio, New York, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, he was part of historically significant exhibitions throughout his career from “Live in Your Head: When Attitudes Become Form” (1969, Kunsthalle Bern), which helped define postminimalism and Arte Povera, to “Surrealism and Us: Caribbean and African Diasporic Artists since 1940” (2024, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth). His awards included a Guggenheim fellowship and multiple NEA fellowships.
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Image credit:
Rafael Ferrer, “Untitled: from The Atelier Project, 1984. Carborundum print on Somerset paper, 15 x 11 in. (38.1 x 27.94 cm), edition: 28 / 43. Collection of University Art Museum, University at Albany, State University of New York on behalf of The University at Albany Foundation, purchase of University at Albany, State University of New York
