Betsy Eby creates nature-based, abstract paintings that convey musical frequencies, animating the quantum entanglements of natural phenomena. Her works are meditations on undisrupted skies, habitats and oceans, calling attention to the natural rhythms of our environment, the elements and our interconnectedness within them. Each piece represents the energetic frisson shared between sentience which she refers to as a collective nervous system. With trowels, knives and heat, Eby pours, spreads and fuses paints made from organic wax and resin from trees, layering gestures of mark making.
Her lifelong classical piano practice, interpreting musical phrasing, Pacific Northwest modernism and its ties to elemental sparseness, Japanese Zen restraint and calligraphy are foundational to the work. Her dueling origin story is one of prospering from the land and one of spiritual cohabitation, recognizing the relationship between reverence and cultivation. On the Indian reservation of Neah Bay, Washington, her ancestors owned a trading post and her father worked in timber. Born on the Pacific coast in Seaside, Oregon; this location is historically noted as the Lewis and Clark expedition terminus. Interconnectedness through indigenous myth and nature-based mysticism holds equal presence with the inventiveness of pioneers and prospectors.
Eby's use of materials is inspired by a 1693 shipwreck site that is located miles from where she was born. A galleon carrying luxury goods from Asia bound for Mexico was blown off course and crashed, spilling all its content upon the Nehalem Spit. For years, beeswax blocks destined to be Catholic liturgical candles for altars of Spanish colonists peppered the dunes. Later she would discover her medium; encaustic.
Through tapping memories of her birthplace origin, each painting is an invitation to reconnect with the music of the natural world and contemplate one’s part in its survival.
Betsy Eby earned her BA in Art History at the University of Oregon in 1990 and has since exhibited her artworks widely, showing across the United States and Europe. Her works are held in numerous public and private collections including the Tacoma Museum of Art, the Columbus Museum of Art, the Georgia Museum of Art, the Jordan Schnitzer Museum, the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art, the Morris Museum and Ulrich Museum of Art. She and her husband, painter Bo Bartlett, split their time between studios in Columbus, Georgia, and Wheaton Island, Maine. A native to Oregon, Eby cites her early influences in the Northwest mystics, Pacific Northwest modernism and atmospheric abstraction.
