LUCIA ZEZZA | DATE 5/9/2026

Artbook @ MoMA PS1 Bookstore presents Kembra Pfahler in conversation with Michael Imperioli

Saturday, May 9, at 4 PM, Artbook @ MoMA PS1 Bookstore presents performance artist Kembra Pfahler in conversation with actor and musician Michael Imperioli for the launch of Kembra Pfahler, published by Rizzoli.

RSVP here for free. *Please note that space is limited to 50 seats.

Pre-order a signed copy here.

Original New York City icon Pfahler has terrorized and tantalized audiences since her arrival in the Lower East Side in the early 1980s. Originally associated with the Cinema of Transgression, Pfahler supported her films with work at an independent porn studio. In the 1990s, she launched The Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black, a rock band associated with Kiss, Alice Cooper and White Zombie. Nude and covered in paint, with blackened teeth and bouffant hair, Pfahler developed a reputation for wild performance that reached far beyond the Lower East Side. Elements of Kabuki theater, surfing, bugs and giant sharks from her legendary shows were later repurposed for performance art. Beginning in the early 2000s, Pfahler titillated gallery-goers with openings featuring dozens of painted women, butt-prints and performances involving endurance and strength. With galleries including Emalin and Deitch Projects, Pfahler created a visual lexicon incorporating occult imagery, bondage and challenging forms of femininity.

Through teaching, activism and performance art, Pfahler serves as a mentor to students, and in recent years, a muse to designers including Rick Owens, Casey Cadwallader and Alessandro Michele. Collecting four decades of ephemera, performance documentation, road pictures and more, the book celebrates Pfahler as a countercultural star.

Kembra Pfahler was born, daughter of Judy Ball and famous surfer Frederick Pfahler in Hermosa Beach, CA. Also, she was a high school gymnast. After dropping out of the School of Visual Arts, Pfahler started provocative performance art. Kembra Pfahler is the lead vocalist and visual mastermind behind The Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black's shocking stage presence. The band was formed by Kembra Pfahler and Samoa in 1988. Phahler and Samoa were collaborating on performance art and making movies at the time and needed to have their own music for their films and live shows. They were already sore thumbs in the New York City underground scenes, but the rock band gave them a new kind of heel.

Michael Imperioli is best known for his starring role as Christopher Moltisanti in the acclaimed TV series The Sopranos—which earned him a Best Supporting Actor Emmy Award—and plays a lead role on season two of HBO’s The White Lotus. He wrote five episodes of The Sopranos; was co-screenwriter of the film Summer of Sam, directed by Spike Lee; and was anthologized in The Nicotine Chronicles, edited by Lee Child. Imperioli has appeared in six of Spike Lee’s films and has also acted in films by Martin Scorsese, Abel Ferrara, Walter Hill, Peter Jackson and the Hughes Brothers. He cohosted the rewatch podcast Talking Sopranos with his Sopranos costar Steve Schirripa, with whom he also penned the best-selling book Woke Up This Morning: The Definitive Oral History of The Sopranos. Additionally, Imperioli is a singer and guitarist in the band ZOPA.

Artbook @ MoMA PS1 Bookstore
Kembra Pfahler in conversation with Michael Imperioli
Saturday, May 9, 4 PM
22-25 Jackson Ave (at 46th Ave.)
Long Island City, NY 11101
(718) 433-1088
RSVP and pre-order a signed book here.
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