Jeffrey Lerer

Last Name: 
Lerer
First Name: 
Jeffrey

My career as a visual artist began with a keen interest in science. I saw science and visual art intertwined.

After formal art studies at the University of Iowa, I spent most of the 1970s living and exhibiting in Mexico. When I returned to New York in 1981, my project designs and general concepts revolved around time-based media, gradually incorporating computer technology into my work.

Within a few years, 3D computer animation took over the studio process. However, for the last 2 years I have been concentrating on drawing and sculpture as a further elaboration of the on-going Gilbert Hotel Project. My intention is to finalize this project with a large installation which will include the movie footage, the drawings, sculptures and other detritus from the process.

By 1992 I was invited to teach computer animation at Pratt Institute. I began teaching at School of Visual Arts in 1998 and am teaching BFA Thesis Research, BFA Thesis Pre-production and Senior BFA Thesis in 3D Computer Animation.

I continue to find teaching very beneficial to my own studio process as well as an important aspect of my professional identity. My animation work has received funding from the following organizations: The Experimental Television Center Finishing Funds Award (92, 94, 96, 01 and 04); Fund for Innovative TV; New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in the category of Video Art (95); New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in the category of Computer Art (01); New York State Council on the Arts Individual Artist Media Production Grant (96, 01, 04,07 and 09) and the T.J. Watson Research Center.