2021 has been an eventful year for everyone. Even given the many crises we've had to face, I've been fortunate to be able to keep up with my creative practice. Highlights are listed below.
New York Curators Barbara Pollack and Anne Verhallen selected my work for the groundbreaking online exhibition Art At a Time Like This, wherein artists reacted to how the art world and their individual art practices had been radically changed by the pandemic. "We perpetually address the question, ‘How Can We Think of Art at a Time Like This?’ In a series of online exhibitions, artists and curators have engaged with this question, from our inaugural exhibition--which attracted over 200,000 viewers in its first three months--to monthly shows confronting not only the pandemic but also Black Lives Matter, systemic justice, the Climate Emergency, New Delhi’s Farmer Revolution, gender discrimination, human rights violations in Hong Kong, the fragility of democracy in the US and many other issues."
I was hugely honored for a small retrospective of my work to be featured at Ars Electronica, the premier international media arts festival in Linz, Austria, showcasing the world's best in art+technology+science. In September 2019, I traveled to Linz to install three different work series and collaborations with Scott Minneman, in an exhibition sponsored by Stochastic Labs. While there, I was deeply honored to meet the President of Austria, Alexander Van Der Bellen!
In late 2019, I launched the Center for Creative Sustainability, a consulting agency that cultivates collaborations, projects, initiatives, and legislation towards sustainability. My experiences of the past several years researching, developing, and implementing creative projects, solutions, and tools for sustainability for designers and artists inspired me to continue devoting my energies to finding solutions to address our climate crisis. This past year, I was honored to participate in panels and collaborations with the Global Climate Action Summit, Metropolis Magazine's Think Tank Series, SFDesign Week, Eco Fashion Week, Stochastic Labs, the San Francisco Art Institute, and In/Visible Talks addressing the critical need for sustainable creative practices, materials, and action.
The Global Museum at San Francisco State University commissioned a new Magic Story Table piece for its "Climate Stories" exhibition. It was set to debut in February 2020, but the opening has been put on pause because of COVID-19 gallery closures. Keep an eye on this page for further updates as to when the exhibition will be open to the public again!
The German Govermnent and Design Council awarded the Cinema Snowglobe Series the 2019 German Design Award, with an awards ceremony in Berlin, Germany.
The Cinema Snowglobe Series also achieved the 2018 CES Innovation Award, and was featured at the CES Showcase in Las Vegas, Nevada.
The Material Language Series and the Kaleidoscope Series were featured at the Writers Grotto, in an 18-month long exhibition.
I was commissioned to complete a new film piece for the permanent collection of the Four Seasons Hotel, Palo Alto.
On December 3, 2018, I stepped down as President of the San Francisco Arts Commission after serving as its president for almost eight years; to my surprise, that day was deemed "JD Beltran Day in San Francisco" by Mayor London Breed and I received a special proclamation from her, in recognition of my outstanding service and contribution to the arts and artists of San Francisco!
Artist Leah Rosenberg and I collaborated on the multi-site installation "Glow" in June 2018 for SFDesignWeek 2018.
In January 2018, I began two years of directing and re-envisioning the Center for Art & Public Life at CCA. Over the course of the subsequent two years, until November 2019, I rebranded the agency into the Center for Impact and launched multiple successful initiatives fostering social and enviromnental sustainability at the college.
In September 2017, I was honored to exhibit two short films (collaborations with Sebastien Bachar, my son) at the exhibition "Anima Mundi" in Venice, Italy, an exhibition produced in conjunction with the 2017 Venice Biennale. The work also was featured in a subsequent catalog of the show.
In May and June 2017, my work was featured in the inaugural show of the Skowhegan brick and mortar gallery on 22nd Street in New York, for the exhibition, "Personal."
"Liminous," a four-year retrospective of my collaborations with Scott Minneman, was featured at the Exploratorium's East Gallery in March 2016 as part of the Exploratorium's "Expanded Cinemas" Series. The exhibition featured work from the "Kaleidoscope Series," the "Crystal Ball Series," the "Cinema Snowglobe Series," "Limn," and my films from my "Evolution" Series which had been commissioned by the Getty Institute for its landmark 2011 exhibition project "Pacific Standard Time." More information can be found here.
My work with Scott Minneman was featured at the renowned juried Currents New Media festival in Santa Fe, New Mexico from June-July, 2016, which features the best of international cutting-edge artworks in the New Media Arts field. Interactive artworks and multi-disciplinary media pieces created from 2012-2016 were featured in the exhibition "Code and Noise," curated by Christine Duval, along with the work of Jim Campbell, Casey Reas, Yang Yongliang, and Ligarano Reese. This traveling exhibition highlighting the latest developments in New Media artworks was first featured at Art Silicon Valley 2015, and has been traveling to different venues across the country. More information can be found here. The exhibition also was featured at Arena One Gallery in Los Angeles, from September-October 2016. More information on the Los Angeles exhibition can be found here.
Our Crystal Ball Series, Future Tense, is an interactive Crystal Ball that was selected to be featured at the Shape Challenge Technology Expo at AT&T park in July 2016. You can see documentation of the project here and a great article on the piece and its inspiration on the AT&T Developer Blog here.
My short film "See" was featured in the Fall 2016 exhibition of the Peephole Cinema in San Francisco, in Orange Alley, from August-October 2016. More information here.
My short film "See" also was selected by Skowhegan Works for its 2016 trimonthly exhibition of featured short films. See the exhibition and more information here.
My work was selected for two international exhibitions recognizing innovation in the field of printmaking: the "8th International Printmaking Biennial Douro" in Lisbon, Portugal in August, 2016, and the "2nd Global Print Exhibition 2015" in Lisbon, Portugal in August-September 2015.
I premiered four new short art films at the 44th International Film Festival Rotterdam, one of the top film festivals in the world, in January, 2015. The films were featured in the festival's "Signals 24/7" Programme, viewed on the Cinema Snowglobe platform that I invented in collaboration with Scott Minneman. More information can be found here.
In August 2014, the Cinema Snowglobe was one of five projects honored with an inaugural grant by Stochastic Labs, an innovative art and design incubator based in Berkeley, California for projects blending art, technology, and science. The grant included seed funding of $20,000, use of a state-of-the-art tool facility and studio space at Stochastic Lab's Berkeley Headquarters, and collaboration opportunities with the other grantees and Stochastic staff.
In June 2014, the Cinema Snowglobes were awarded the International New Technological Art Award (NTAA), recognizing the top 2014 artworks in the world blending art and technology. The artworks were featured in the NTAA exhibition "Update_5" in Ghent, Belgium, in November 2014.
From 2012-2014, I curated and authored the Public Art Master Art Plan for the Yerba Buena Community Benefits District. The plan set forth the strategy for selecting and commissioning major permanent and temporary public artworks for the downtown Yerba Buena District, affecting the permanent city landscape in the main arts and museum district of the city of San Francisco. The Master Plan was approved in April 2014, and currently is being implemented.
In March 2014, the interactive work "Color of a Color," my collaboration with Scott Minneman and neuroscientist Bevil Conway, was featured in the group exhibition "Mind Matters" at the Sandler Neuroscience Building in the University of California San Francisco Mission Bay Campus.
In June 2013, the Cinema Snowglobes that I invented with Scott Minneman debuted at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in "The Making Of..." exhibition during the museum's closing weekend.
In April 2013, the San Francisco Arts Commission debuted "Arts for the City: Civic Art and Urban Change, 1932-2012" published by HeyDay Press (Berkeley 2013). I co-authored the Foreword and authored the Postscript for the book and co-produced, curated, and was photo editor for the featured photographers.
In May 2013, I was awarded the John H. Hauberg Fellowship to create new work based in glass at the internationally renowned Pilchuck School near Seattle, Washington.
In July 2013, the interactive artwork "Underneath" my collaboration with Scott Minneman, was featured in the group exhibition "Electronic Pacific" at the SOMArts Gallery in San Francisco.