Robert Beckmann was born in Philadelphia and grew up in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. After graduating from the College of Wooster, he took M.A. and M.F.A. degrees from the University of Iowa, Iowa City. Later, Beckmann left teaching at Northern Illinois University after four years to pursue a career as a professional artist. Over 200 of his murals exist throughout the country, and his paintings are in many public and private collections.

Beckmann is a winner of a number of fellowships from the Nevada State Arts Council and the Western States Arts Foundation. A past vice chair of the Las Vegas Arts Commission, he received the Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts from the State of Nevada in 1996. He was selected as the publisher's pick for Best Artist in the Las Vegas Review Journal's 1999 The Best of Las Vegas.

Beckmann is best known for his large-scale paintings in an exhibition entitled The Body of a House, which has toured to 20 museums in the United States and St. Petersburg, Russia, and is permanently housed in the Nevada Museum of Art. In this series of eight large-scale canvases, Beckmann reveals the rapid disassembly of a house by a nuclear explosion on the Nevada Test Site. Beckmann is also noted for a series of murals which hang in the U.S. Botanic Garden in Washington, D.C. He is profiled in numerous publications, including William L. Fox's book, Mapping the Empty: Eight Artists and Nevada.

One-man exhibitions since 1994

Amarillo Museum of Art, Amarillo, TX
Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio
College of Charleston, SC (during the Spoleto Festival)
College of Wooster, Ohio
Cuesta College, San Luis Obispo, CA
HERE Art Gallery, New York City, NY
High Desert Museum, Bend, OR
Nevada Institute for Contemporary Art (NICA), Las Vegas, NV
Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, NV
Radford University, Radford, VA
Ringling School of Art and Design, Sarasota, FL
Sam Francis Gallery, Crossroads School, Santa Monica, CA
Santa Barbara City College, Santa Barbara, CA
State Museum, The Artists’ Necropolis, St. Petersburg, Russia
University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL
University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ
University of California, Riverside, CA
University of Idaho, Moscow, ID
University of Maine, Orono, ME
University of Maryland, College Park, MD
University of Nevada Las Vegas, Ham Hall Lobby
University of Wisconsin, Whitewater, WI
Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA

Two- or Three-Person exhibitions since 1994

Bellevue Art Museum, Bellevue, WA
T. Curtsnoc Gallery, Miami, FL
University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV (1993 and 1996)
Orange County Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Anna, CA
pARTS Gallery, Minneapolis, MN
Small Works, Las Vegas, NV
Terrain Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Important Group exhibitions since 1994

Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach, FL
Contemporary Arts Collective, Desire, 5th annual juried exhibit, 1st prize
Helsinki City Art Museum, Finland
Institute of Contemporary Art, Central House of Artists, Moscow, Russia
Institute of History, A1 Gallery, Tallinn, Estonia
Kemper Museum of Art and Design, Kansas City, MO
Millennium Museum, Washington, DC
Moderna Galerija, Ljubljana, Slovenia
Muckenthaler Art Center, Fullerton, CA
Nevada Institute for Contemporary Art, Las Vegas, NV
1950 Gallery, New York, NY
Regina Public Library, Dunlop Gallery, Saskatchewan, Canada.
Smithsonian Institution, International Gallery, Washington, DC
World Financial Center, Battery Park, New York City, NY
Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CN

Work in Public Collections

Amarillo Museum of Art, TX
Bank of America, Las Vegas, NV
Boise Cascade Corporation, Boise, ID
Boise Gallery of Art, ID
Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio
City of Las Vegas, NV (Mayor’s Office)
City of North Las Vegas, NV (City Hall)
College of Charleston, SC
College of Wooster, OH
Denver Art Museum, CO
Idaho State University, Pocatello, ID
Institute Francais D'Ecosse, Edinburgh, Scotland
Mobile Rehabilitation Center, Mobile, AL
Northeast Nevada Museum, Elko, NV
Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, NV
Nevada State Library, Carson City, NV
Northern Illinois University, Dekalb, IL
Radford University, Radford, VA
Ringling School of Art and Design, Sarasota, FL
State Museum, Artists’ Necropolis, St. Petersburg, Russia
University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL
University of California, Riverside, CA
University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
University of Maryland, College Park, MD
University of Nevada, Las Vegas (Library; Special Collections), NV
US Botanic Garden, Washington, DC
Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA
Western Illinois University, McComb, IL
Yale University, New Haven, CN

About Beckmann Studio

U.S. Botanic Garden

Murals

Vegas Vanitas

Body of a House

Studio Paintings

Links

Beckmann Studio
1125 Prospect Street
Ashland, OR 97520
(541) 201-0388
beckmannstudio@charter.net

© Beckmann Studio