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Some artists are prolific, churning out project after project at a speed that leaves onlookers wondering about their superhuman pace. Some have a much slower process — painstaking in intricate detail — and Eric Beltz is one of the latter.
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Laced with themes of ethnobotany, myth, religion, ritual and transcendence, the work of Eric Beltz is defined by his heavily educated perspective and
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Raised by farmers and cultivated by mystics, Eric Beltz’s hypnotically detailed drawings describe worlds filled with rural magic. Working in series with titles like American Visions, Back to Eden, Elementary Forces, and Trance Farm he blends history, religion, shamanism, nostalgia, origin myths, the vernacular, and botany. Injecting text like both an essayist and a poet, Beltz’s further expands his references crossing cultures and historical eras.
Envisioning a variety of characters surrounded by quotes from the founding fathers, books on Satanism and witchcraft, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, the Bible and Apocryphal Gospels, Beltz’s drawings are macabre yet humorous, containing as much madness as wisdom. Referred to as “High Definition Drawing” by the self-described hypnotist, Eric Beltz’s work involves equal parts ethno botany, religion, history, and finely-rendered detail. The suggestive connections of unrelated texts forming compositional lines and swooshes around the various characters are didactic yet remain enigmatic as pictures. Likewise, the plants, buildings and landscapes behind the figures are equally specific in reference (a pile of weeds may be a medieval herbal remedy for dysentery), but are offered only as scenery. Although crisp in definition, Beltz’s drawings offer a translucent world of infinite depth.
In 2000, Beltz received his BFA from California State University, Fullerton, and in 2004, he received his MFA from University of California, Santa Barbara. In 2009, Beltz was awarded the 2009 Pulse Prize from Pulse Art Fair, New York, NY.
Selected solo exhibitions include The Cave of Treasures, Arts, Design and Architecture Museum, Santa Barbara, CA (2014); Revival Wall, Texas Contemporary, Houston, TX (2013); Sprit, Koplin Del Rio Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2012); Trance Farm, Morgan Lehman Gallery, New York, NY (2011); The Philosopher's Garden, Rio Hondo College, Whittier, CA (2009); Solo project at Pulse, New York (2009).
Selected group exhibitions include Sleep of Reason (curated by Catlin Moore), Cypress College Art Gallery, Cypress, CA (2014); Phantom Color, CB1 Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2014); Good Intentions: Re-Imagining Norman Rockwell's Boyscouts (2013); Subliminal Projects, Los Angeles, CA (2013); Nudes, Guerrero Gallery, San Francisco, CA (2013); Against The Grain: Wood and Contemporary Art, Craft, and Design, Mint Museum of Craft and Design, Charlotte, NC (2013); Museum of Art and Design, New York, NY (2013); Unlived Histories, Flanders Art Gallery, Raleigh, NC (2012); Sublime: Nature, Science, and the Divine, Koplin Del Rio Gallery, Culver City, CA (2012).
For additional information about this artist, visit Mutual Art
