Head with Blue Neural Wave from artist, Judy Moonelis is a porcelain sculpture, 12”x8”x6”, 2019.

Judy Moonelis, a New York City artist, has exhibited widely, in numerous solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally. Solo and invitational exhibitions include the 9th International Frankfurt Triennial; The Katonah Museum of Art, NY; The Temple Gallery, Rome. Historic site installations include The Basilica of St Mary, Minneapolis, MN; The Eastern State Penitentiary, Philadelphia, PA; The Church of St Paul the Apostle, NYC; The Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue and Museum, NYC. Her work has been represented by John Elder Gallery in Chelsea, NYC, Rena Bransten, San Francisco and Helen Drutt Gallery, Philadelphia, where she has had several solo exhibitions.

Moonelis’s artist grants include two National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, two New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships and the Virginia A. Groot Grant. Her work is represented in major public collections, including the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC; Museum of Arts and Design, NYC; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Hermitage Museum, Russia; Museo de Arte Moderno, Santa Domingo, DR; Philadelphia Museum of Art; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia; High Museum, Atlanta, GA; Everson Museum, Syracuse, NY; Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation, LA, CA.

Her work has been a subject in numerous publications and reviewed in The New York Times; Art in America; World Sculpture News; ArtNews; Sculpture Magazine; Artopia/Arts Journal; American Ceramics; American Craft Magazine; The Boston Globe; The Philadelphia Inquirer, Ceramics: Art and Perception International (Australia); Ceramic Review (England); Crafts (England); Ceramics (Japan); Ceramica (Spain); European Crafts (Germany).

She has lectured extensively at museums and universities, and taught at Rhode Island School of Design, New York University, Hunter College. Her artist residencies include the Art Institute of Chicago, RISD and Cranbrook. She received her BFA from Tyler School of Art and her MFA from New York State College of Ceramics, Alfred University. She is currently Professor of Fine Arts at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Florham Campus, NJ. For additional information go to www.judymoonelis.com

Judy Moonelis, Artist Statement

The intricate human body provides the conceptual focus for my artistic practice. The work represents investigations into varied internal and external anatomical structures. Human brain function, respiratory, circulatory, nervous and sensory systems are sources for my art. Historic and contemporary anatomical studies often supply a visual groundwork.

Content ranges from brain research, depicted in the pieces “Mirror Neuron Strands”, and “Brain Cell”, to the interconnections between living species, as referenced in the piece titled “Wonder”. The subject of my current work and research is focused on the fields of neuroscience and anatomy.

The scientific illustrations of Santiago Ramon y Cajal are a resource for my current work. Considered the “father of modern neuroscience” Cajal won a Nobel Prize (1906) for his work on the “neuron doctrine”, demonstrating the architecture of neural structures as individual cells.

I am interested in the ways art and science together can expand our notions of identity. This research is evident in my artwork “Neural Portraits” as well as “Celestial Bodies” site projects, recently exhibited at the renowned Basilica of St Mary in Minneapolis. Other recent site projects relate the human body with the sites’ architectural features, including Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, the Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue I NYC and the Church of St Paul the Apostle in NYC.