Installation view of “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images,” Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), University of Pennsylvania. | Photo: Constance Mensch
TEN YEARS AGO, curator Hallie Ringle embarked upon a fact-finding mission to learn about the life and work of Mavis Pusey (1928-2019), the Jamaican-American artist who pursued fashion before concentrating on painting and printmaking. Pusey studied at the Art Students League with Will Barnet (1961-65), worked at Robert Blackburn’s Printmaking Workshop (1969–72), and taught at a few schools, including the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia.
Decades later, the city is hosting the first-ever retrospective of the artist. “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images” is on view through this weekend at the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) at the University of Pennsylvania. The exhibition travels next to the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles and the Studio Museum in Harlem.
Pusey was known for her geometric abstraction at a time when most Black artists were focused on figuration, producing realistic images reflecting Black experiences. Her flat, shapely forms referenced the body and her hard-edged compositions evinced building materials, construction, and destruction symbolizing urban landscapes and social change, and also exploring musical themes.
From the 1960s to 1990s, Pusey’s work was shown in solo and group exhibitions, often at university galleries on campuses where she taught. Notably, she was also featured in “Contemporary Black Artists in America,” the controversial exhibition curated by Robert M. Doty at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1971.
Toward the end of her life, she was living in Virginia and nearly faded from memory, overlooked even as contemporary curators and scholars focused their attention on an ever-widening circle of Black artists active in the 20th century.
Mavis Pusey. | Courtesy Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Archives, Pennsylvania
Even Thelma Golden, director and chief curator of the Studio Museum, was unfamiliar with Pusey when she spotted her work in an auction catalog and asked Ringle to see what she could find out about the artist. That was in 2015. Ringle was an assistant curator at the Studio Museum at the time. She spent the next decade in pursuit of Pusey. Ringle was able find and meet the artist, visiting with her on several occasions before she died in 2019. The curator continued to probe, delving into Pusey’s archives, piecing together her biography, tracking down artworks and working with conservators to restore some of them.
The extensive research project culminated in “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images,” a five-decade survey featuring more than 60 works, across paintings, drawings, and prints, including seven paintings shown publicly for the first time. The presentation charts Pusey’s journey from Jamaica to New York, London, Paris, Philadelphia, and Virginia; explores her evolving approach to geometric abstraction; and considers her unique voice and contributions to American abstraction.
“What stood out to me about Mavis through her art and archive has been just how persistent she was as an artist and how she truly did see the world through abstractions,” said Ringle in the video below. “A key moment in the research was seeing Mavis’s early work, and especially in relationship to her pattern making and fashion work. We see her take the form of the body and create a person through these flat shapes that almost look like a pattern laid out on a table as if a garment that’s ready for assembly.”
Ringle, interim director and chief curator at ICA Philadelphia, curated the exhibition with Kiki Teshome, curatorial assistant at the Studio Museum in Harlem. Teshome curated the archival presentation, including photographs, exhibition memorabilia, newspaper articles, notes and poetry, clothing, and other ephemera.
Among the archival materials is a hand-written list Pusey titled “I Desire.” More than a dozen entries written in all caps, several are edited, with words crossed out and others inserted. She included many aspirations related to her personality and life in general, but the majority of the items reveal what she desired for herself in terms of her art practice.
“Mavis’s Desire List, it was, in part, what we used to guide the exhibition,” Ringle said. “In the absence of an artist, we have to go on what she determined for herself. This was quite literally a list of what she wanted. And she wanted to be well known. She wanted to show her work widely and she wanted to be successful. And she certainly did not want to be forgotten.” CT
“Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images” is on view at the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, from July 12-Dec. 7, 2025. The exhibition travels next to the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, and will be presented at the Studio Museum in Harlem in Spring 2027
MAVIS PUSEY, “Nuvae,” mid-1960s (oil on burlap, canvas, 30 x 40 inches). | Private collection
Curators Hallie Ringle and Kiki Teshome discuss the life and work of Mavis Pusey (1928-2019) and the landmark exhibition “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images,” featuring more than 60 paintings, drawings, and prints. | Video by ICA Philadelphia
Installation view of “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images,” Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), University of Pennsylvania. | Photo: Constance Mensch
MAVIS PUSEY, “Dancers,” n.d. (oil on canvas, 37 3/4 x 31 1/2 inches. | Private collection
Installation view of “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images,” Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), University of Pennsylvania. | Photo: Constance Mensch
MAVIS PUSEY, Untitled, n.d. (ink and graphite on paper). | Private collection
MAVIS PUSEY, “Within Manhattan,” n.d. (oil on canvas, 73 x 96 inches. | Private collection
Installation view of “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images,” Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), University of Pennsylvania. | Photo: Constance Mensch
MAVIS PUSEY, “Impact on Vibration,” 1968 (screenprint, 33 x 22 1/2 inches, full margins. | Private collection
MAVIS PUSEY, “Personante,” n.d. (oil on canvas, 53 1/2 x 75 inches. | Private collection
Installation view of “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images,” Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), University of Pennsylvania. | Photo: Constance Mensch
MAVIS PUSEY, “Recumbancy,” 1963 (oil on canvas, 38 x 50 inches.| Private collection
FIND MORE about Mavis Pusey on her website
BOOKSHELF
A new catalog documenting “Mavis Pusey: Mobile Images” is forthcoming. The volume will be the first major publication dedicated to the artist. Mavis Pusey is also featured in the following exhibition catalogs: “Magnetic Fields: Expanding American Abstraction, 1960s to Today” and “Whitney Biennial 2024: Even Better Than the Real Thing.”
