BIOGRAPHY
Laurence Elias is a Berkeley, CA-based artist who works in
photography, digital, painting, sculpture and weaving. Laurence has
had a former career as a physician/scientist, during which he
continued to pursue art practice, viewing, and study. He received his
MFA from the California College of the Arts in 2018 and has
frequently exhibited his work regionally and nationally. Although he
conceives of his work as abstraction, he is aware how his years
studying bio-organic structures and processes inform his visual
proclivity.
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Born in Brooklyn, NY, he resides and works in Berkeley, CA.
Exhibitions:
Two-Person and Solo:
Field of Vision, with Sandra Kelch, Gearbox Gallery, Oakland, CA
(2024)
Reflect/Spirit/Light at Sebastopol Center for the Arts, Sebastopol, CA
(2019)
Group Shows, Juried or Curated:
2024
Sessions 06 and 07, Galeria Azur, Berlin, Germany
Cut Paste Create, The Art of Collage at Bedford Gallery, Walnut
Creek, CA. Juried by Rangsook Yoon, Sr. Curator Sarasota Art
Museum, and Kimberly Acebo-Arteche, Co-Executive Director,
Berkeley Art Center
Connected at Gallery Route One, Pt. Reyes Station, CA. Juried by
TaVee Lee, Gallery Manager, Transmission Gallery, Oakland
2023
Within Sight or From Imagination at Gearbox Gallery, Oakland, CA,
Juried by Jeremy Morgan, artist
Abstract 2023, Awarded Prize (3rd place), New York Center for
Photographic Art, https://www.nyc4pa.com/abstract-2020-21and
Print Catalogue, Juried by Darren Ching of Klompching Gallery,
Brooklyn, NY
2022
Blessed Unrest at Gallery Route One, Point Reyes Station, CA. Juried
by Jack Fischer of Jack Fischer Gallery, San Francisco
2021
Crossing The Divide, at Gallery Route One, Point Reyes Station, CA,
Juried by Donna Seager of Seager Gray Gallery, Mill Valley, CA
2020
Fragments at ARC Gallery, San Francisco, Juried by Jen Tough, Jen
Tough Gallery, Santa Fe, NM
Out of the Box, Healdsburg Center for the Arts, Healdsburg, CA
California Open, 15th Annual National Competition, TAG Gallery,
Los Angeles, CA Juried by Kate Mothes, Curator of Young Space, and
Dovetail Magazine
Some Speechless Thing (Part II of Annual Members Show) at Berkeley
Art Center, Berkeley, CA, Juried from Part I open submissions by
Griff Williams, Gallery 16, San Francisco
2019
The Naked Print at Rhode Island Center for Photographic Arts,
Providence, RI, Juried by Stephen Fisher, Professor, Art Department,
Rhode Island College, Providence
Art + Movement at Gearbox Gallery, Oakland, CA, Juried by Maria
Porges, Artist, Writer, and Faculty member, California College of the
Arts, San Francisco
2018
Caught in the Fray, 14th Annual Textiles Exhibition, at College Street
Gallery, Oakland, CA, Curated by Josh Faught, California College of
the Arts
California College of the Arts M.F.A. Show at Minnesota Street
Project, San Francisco, CA
Wave-Forms at Embark Gallery, Oakland, CA, Juried by Leila Grothe,
Assoc Curator, Wattis Institute, San Francisco and Baltimore Museum
of Art
2017
Making Thinking at Hubble Street Gallery, San Francisco, Curated by
Shaun O’Dell, California College of the Arts
5th Annual Juried Art Show at the Piedmont Center for the Art
Piedmont, CA
2016
Krowsworkers/FARM at Krowswork Gallery, Oakland, CA, Curated
by Jasmine Moorhead
2015
Drawn to Line at UCBX Gallery, San Francisco, CA
Collect! at Berkeley Art Center, Berkeley, CA
Press:
Studio Visit (a print periodical) Vol.48, pp 62-65 (2021)
Education:
• California College of the Arts, M.F.A., 2018
• Post-Baccalaureate Certificate in Visual Arts, UC
Berkeley Extension, San Francisco, 2016
• Art Coursework and Workshops (1966-2016):
◦ U.C. Berkeley Extension
◦ Stanford University
◦ Stanford University Continuing Studies
◦ Kala Institute (Berkeley)
◦ University of New Mexico
◦ Harwood Foundation (Albuquerque, NM)
◦ Princeton University
• Stanford University, M.D., 1972
• Princeton University, A.B., 1967
STATEMENT
While based upon representational imagery, my objective is abstraction that
features an unexpected and uncanny sort of beauty. My practice entails use of
unusual materials and means. Essential themes include the constructed nature of
our visual experience of the world, and the emergence of organic complexity
from repeated and overlapping simple forms; the work explores perception as
an active process.
The current work entails a multi-step digitally mediated process, realized on
specifically formed reflective or pearlescent supports. They are created from
close-up photographic images, typically from nature or of other art. Their final
shapes are based on the Platonic solids, as viewed from particular vantage
points. These pieces are shown at a remove from the wall, which along with
their shapes, lines and angles, makes them easily experienced as solid objects. I
am especially intrigued by the appearance geometric patterns nested within
other geometric structures. I also construct actual three dimensional abstract
wall sculptures from such flat panels, that have their own visual cues of
spatiality.
