[2] From 1997 to her retirement in 2013, she held the Lisa and Bernard Selz Chair in Art History and Archaeology.
[5][6][7] She has been the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship (1987–88) and a senior fellow of the board of Dumbarton Oaks.
[3] Pasztory was born in Hungary and immigrated to the United States in 1956 after the anti-Communist revolutions.
She remained at Columbia University and received her Ph.D. from the institution in 1971 for a dissertation entitled "The Murals of Tepantitla, Teotihuacan".
[8][3] Her research into the Great Goddess of Teotihuacan has been influential and provided the basis for many later art historical studies.