Arabella Proffer

Arabella Proffer is an artist, author, and co-founder of the indie label Elephant Stone Records. Her work combines interests in portraiture, visionary art, the history of medicine, and biomorphic abstraction. She delves into the her practice of oil painting tying together its relationships to biology, nature, and emerging sciences.

She attended Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA before receiving her BFA from California Institute of the Arts where she studied under artists such as John Mandel, Derek Boshier, Jim Shaw, and Suzan Pitt. Arabella’s work is in over 60 private collections, and she participates in solo and group exhibitions throughout North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Australia.

She has authored several art books including, The National Portrait Gallery of Kessa: The Art of Arabella Proffer (2011) Gurls (2016-17) and The Restrooms of Cleveland (2019) . She was awarded an Ohio Arts Council grant in 2016, Akron Soul Train Fellowship in 2019, and a Satellite Award from the Andy Warhol Foundation and SPACES in 2020. Her work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Plain Dealer, The Portland Review, Hi-Fructose, Juxtapoz, The Harvard Gazette, Scene, Snob, SF Weekly, Dallas Arts Review, Pittsburgh City Paper, Westfälische Nachrichten, Hektoen International Medical Journal, Creative Minds in Medicine, and more.

Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and bred in Southern California, she and her husband live on the shores of Lake Erie in Cleveland, Ohio.