"What
I find most interested about the Niagara River is the way in which
the Nineteenth Century is palpably evident under the veneer of
present-day reality. Almost every site and viewpoint along its
varied thirty-six mile course is laden with history. . . .
In
recent years, I have been using the art of photography to research
the ways in which the pictorial strategies of the nineteenth century
color the way in which the American landscape is apprehended by
today's viewers.
. .
. Photography, of course, is the perfect medium for the investigation.
It can reveal the truth of present day specifics and particularities,
while at the same time, by conscious choice of lighting and pictorial
structure, suggest the aesthetic legacy of the present."
John
Pfahl's work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions at the Los Angeles
County Museum of Art, the George Eastman House International Museum
of Photography, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and the Albright-Knox
Art Gallery. Currently represented by Nina Freudenheim Gallery in
Buffalo and Janet Borden Gallery in New York, Pfahl is the winner
of two National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships and received an
Honorary Doctorate from Niagara University in 1990. His work is in
the collections of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, The Museum of Modern
Art, The Chicago Art Institute, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and
many other public and private collections.