He was born in Cheltenham and is married to the English figurative painter Cathryn Kuhfeld, née Showan.

Kuhfeld is the only child of a German prisoner of war and an English classical pianist.

[2] During 1977-80 Kuhfeld studied under the painter Peter Greenham[1] CBE, RA.

[3] While at the Royal Academy Schools Kuhfeld won various notable scholarships and prizes: 1978-79 David Murray Landscape Prize; 1979 Royal Academy of Art Silver Medal for Drawing, Royal College of Surgeons Dooley Prize for Anatomical Drawing; 1980 Elizabeth Greenshield Foundation Scholarship and Richard Ford Scholarship for study in Spain.

In 1985 the New Grafton Gallery in London gave Kuhfeld his first major exhibition, with the painter Christa Ga, which helped establish him as one of the up-and-coming members of the New English Art movement.