Like many of his fellow artists with ties to Indianapolis's German-American community, he went to Germany to study; he trained in Hamburg and Dresden.

[2] When he returned to America, he worked as a printer in Chicago and taught school, and later took classes in fine arts.

He helped victims of the 1918 flu epidemic being treated in the local schoolhouse and collected money for miners on strike in Madrid, New Mexico.

At his request, he was cremated and his ashes were spread in an arroyo (creek) near Mabel Dodge Luhan's house in Taos.

Ufer's New Mexico paintings are characterized by genre scenes of Native American life and landscapes executed in a high-keyed palette.