Mavis Pusey

Mavis Iona Pusey (September 17, 1928 – April 20, 2019) was a Jamaican-born American abstract artist.

Biography Pusey was born on September 17, 1928, Her parents died when she was born. At the age of 9, Pusey learned how to sew and make dresses from her aunt. Her first job was at a clothing factory in Kingston. She told The New York Amsterdam News in 1978, "Accidentally, I went into Will Barnet’s class of painting. After a month I said, ‘I think I’m in the wrong class.’ But by this time I had become so involved in my painting, I just stayed." In London, she worked as pattern maker for Singer Corporation. There she met Birgit Skiöld, a Swedish printmaker and modern artist.

After spending a year in Paris in 1968, Pusey returned to New York City in 1969. She started working with Robert Blackburn and during this time created –Broken construction at Noon (c. 1970), Decaying Construction (c. 1970), and Impact on Vibration (1968).

During the 1970s, she participated in a community art space called Communications Village operated by printmaker Benjamin Leroy Wigfall in Kingston, NY. Andrews made prints with the help of printer assistants who had been taught printmaking by Wigfall.

Pusey also became a teacher and taught at may places, including The New School, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and Rutgers University.

Pusey's works are held in the permanent collections of the Cochran Collection in LaGrange, Georgia,

Pusey received awards and grants from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation and The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation, during her career. .” The exhibit featured works from her 50 year career.

Collections Pusey has works in many different collections in museums across the United States, Including:

Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, Alabama Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, Ohio Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA), Detroit, Michigan Grand Rapids Art Museum, Grand Rapids, Michigan Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Manhattan, New York Sheldon Museum of Art in Lincoln, Nebraska Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington D.C. The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York Tougaloo College in Tougaloo, Mississippi