Born in New York, Eleanor Yudkoff began her studies in art as a young person at the Brooklyn Museum Art School. She continued her training at Brooklyn College, New York, with an emphasis on drawing and painting (BA). While at Brooklyn College she attended American Artists School, New York. Moving to the West Coast, Yudkoff attended California State University Los Angeles, with an emphasis in painting(MA).

Yudkoff is best known for her richly colored, dreamy, contemplative work; and allegorical figures and stylistic landscapes. Light shines softly over the painted canvas, giving the viewer a sense of peace. In many pieces she shows the “…figure looking out on the landscape instead of being in the landscape.” “Animals,” she feels, “are neutral images, expressing nature…safe.” During her extensive career three major bodies of work emerged from her ongoing love affair with the figure and nature. “Reflections,” looks at how a person feels by being a viewer rather than a participant in life.” “Album Leaves” tells allegorical stories through mythical paintings such as “Golden City,” a work portraying a woman who “…refuses to accept the thought that life is not going to be any better. She determines to be alive.” At one turning point in her career, Yudkoff experimented with a playful series of paintings, “Devices,” mechanical devices that appear as biological constructions. “Islands,” her most recent body of work, symbolically depicts rebirth.

Eleanor Yudkoff has primarily exhibited in Southern California galleries and museums such as, Luckman Gallery, CSULA, CA; Arboretum Gallery; Fine Arts Factory, CA; and the Los Angeles California Museum of Art (5 years-rental gallery). Yudkoff has also shown in the Junior Arts Center adjunct gallery, Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department, CA; City of Pasadena Council offices, CA.

Yudkoff’s paintings are found in private collections across the United States. California collectors include Mr. & Mrs. Alex Kempton, CA. Marilyn Noad, painter, CA; Lyla Crespin, Getty Museum, CA. National collectors include Angel Trias, New York; Joshua Spieler, Medical Book Publisher, Elsevere Publishing, New York; Dennis Owsley, Jazz expert & Fine Art Photographer, Public Television host; and Mr. & Mrs. Bruce Corker, Rancho Aloha, Kona Coffee Plantation owners, Hawaii.

Lyla Crespin, Getty Foundation, writes, “Eleanor’s relationship of mysterious figures and animals to her invented landscapes are singular in concept and perception. Artist, Sam Clayberger, states, “You can’t mistake Elly’s paintings for anyone else’s. Her approach is never what you expect…[paintings are] unique unto their own.” Marilyn Noad, painter, said, “I particularly admire the allegorical and mythological quality of her paintings…evocative.”