Spring 2017 Arts Colloquium + Curatorial Conversations

Spring 2017 Arts Colloquium + Curatorial Conversations

The UCSB Department of Art and College of Creative Studies present Spring 2017 Visiting Artist Colloquium and Curatorial Conversations. The program offers a wide range of voices in dialogue, exploring the topics of contemporary art, theory, and cultural production by emerging and established visiting artists, as well as members of UCSB’s own campus faculty and graduate students.

Laurel Beckman & Eric Beltz

introduction by Carlos Ochoa, graduate student, Department of Art, UCSB

Laurel Beckman
“Nurturing eccentric positions and spaces, my work favors uncertainty and public display. I’m interested in themes concerning affect, including those at the crossroads of consciousness + social conditions, meta-physics + science, perceptual phenomena + stage/screen space. With a background in image-making and public art, I’ve been focusing on video for some time; its mutable potential and its ability to deliver visual and conceptual pleasure, depth and nuance of meaning. I’m a believer in the power of free-association and the non-sequitur as both everyday happenings and serious tools employed in art-making. My projects have screened in festivals, public spaces, museums and galleries in over 30 countries including the USA, Peru, Canada, Italy, Palestine, France, Australia, India, Brazil, Switzerland, China, Iran, Spain, and the Netherlands. I’m a professor of Experimental Video/Animation and Public Practices at UCSB.”

Eric Beltz
Eric Beltz has devoted himself to graphite on Bristol for over a decade. His drawings are intensely detailed with form, text, pattern, and stunningly-rich grayscale that transcends the limits of the media. Working as a visual essayist and poet, Beltz explores and combines a range of topics: origin myths, American history, ethnobotany, ancient religions, and taboo symbolism. He balances the narrow path of pencil on paper by his far-reaching interests, seeking discoveries in uncommon mixtures of rare knowledge. Beltz received his MFA from UCSB where he currently teaches drawing in the Department of Art. His work has been featured in Art in America, Juxtapoz, Flaunt Magazine, and others. His work has been shown in galleries and museums across the United States.

Carlos Ochoa
Carlos Ochoa is a current MFA candidate at UCSB introducing the speakers. He works at the intersection of art and new technologies to explore new experiences in practice and reception. Through Virtual Reality Technology, he attempts to push the pictorial landscape into an immersive experience.