Bullet Point Artist Biography

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Artist Biography – Bartosz Beda

1984 – Bartosz Beda is born on May 11th in Lodz, Poland. He is the youngest child. His great grandfather escaped the Imperial Russian Army before the 1917 revolution which monetized the village given by Tsar Nikolai II Alexandrovich Romanov and settled down in Lodz, Poland. His great-aunt Antoni Beda, a Captain of the Polish Airforce, escaped Poland in the early days of WWII to train pilots and fought in the Battle of England. His parents hid the family history from Communism to avoid prosecution.

1989 – The family moves to Nurzec Stacja, a small village in northern Poland on the Belarusian border. In the countryside, Beda spends his childhood in a natural environment which shapes his character as a young boy. His Catholic mother sends him to church, where he becomes an altar boy.

1994 – The family moves back to Lodz for financial reasons.

1999 – Beda goes to a private secondary art school. He wins several national competitions in art during that time.

2003 – Beda works several months for movie director Marek Skrobecki, on the “Ichthys” animation production. The movie receives international attention.

2003 – Beda applies to the Academy of Art in Krakow and gets denied.

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Artist Biography | Bartosz Beda

2004 – Beda moves to Edinburgh, Scotland for work. After about eight months he moves to Manchester, UK.

2005 – He comes back to Lodz, Poland, and works for the movie production “Peter and the Wolf,” which receives an Oscar in 2007. Shortly after, he goes back to Manchester, UK, where he gets a job in a bakery.

2008 – Beda gets accepted to the Manchester School of Art at Manchester Metropolitan University. Beda falls in love with Manchester and its industries, which remind him of Lodz, Poland.

2012 – Beda is selected for the Saatchi New Sensations exhibition. He won a national competition in the UK and is interviewed and featured in numerous newspapers and magazines.

  • Beda is awarded a scholarship to Dresden Academy of Arts in Dresden, Germany.

2013 – In the fall, Beda travels to the United States to visit his then-girlfriend. He rents a studio in Moscow, Idaho to work on a new body of works for a solo exhibition in Madrid, Spain.

2014 – Beda continues showing in the USA and internationally. He decides to stay in the States and get married to his girlfriend, Nishiki.

  • Beda is a finalist for the Williams Drawing Prize inConnecticut, USA,
  • He wins second place in the Viewpoints 2014 competition at the Aljira Center for Contemporary Art in New Jersey, USA and receives the first check-in on US land.
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Artist Biography | Bartosz Beda

2015 – Bartosz is preparing for solo exhibition in at BAC (Bogota Arte Contemporaneo) in Bogota, Columbia. He paints large-scale paintings that responded to the events taking place in Ukraine and across Europe.

  • Beda transitions from the United Kingdom to his studio in Moscow, Idaho. His daughter is born.

2016 – Beda shows solo at Jackson-Teed Gallery in York, England. Nobody shows up for the opening reception due to an unexpected winter storm save for a local newspaper journalist, who writes a review of the show for a local newspaper.

  • He is selected for a fellowship at Fondazione Per’l Arte in Rome, Italy. This incredible experience brings fresh energy to his paintings. Two paintings stay in the permanent collection of the foundation.
  • Beda founds Execute Magazine for both emerging and established artists.

2017 – Beda shows at Rosemary Duffy Gallery in Duffy, Florida. The Miami area has a significant impact on Bartosz, who desires to move back to a bigger city shortly after.

  • Beda wins first place for Interstate Group Exhibition at the CWU Sarah Spurgeon Gallery in Ellensburg, WA, USA and receives the Idaho Arts Commission Quick Grant for Individual Artists, Boise, ID, USA.
  • He moves to a bigger studio. Depression and struggles with lack of networking and resources leave Beda questioning if his future is in Moscow, Idaho.

2018 – His wife, Nishiki, gets a job at Southern Methodist University, which was a decisive factor for moving out of Idaho to Texas. Before that news, Beda was awarded ten weeks of residency at GoggleWorks Center for the Arts in Reading, PA, USA.

  • Beda teaches as an adjunct in a senior residency program for the Dallas School District in Dallas, TX, USA for one year.
  • Beda has a solo exhibition; Ten Starts from One at the Mildred M. Cox Gallery in Fulton, MO, USA. He presented large-scale paintings.
  • Reading Public Museum kept three paintings for its permanent collection.

2019 – Beda moves to a new warehouse studio in Mesquite, TX, and prepares a new body of work for two solo exhibitions at Brownsville Museum of Fine Art in Brownsville, TX, and Hopkins Center for the Arts (Redepenning Gallery) in Hopkins, MA.

  • Beda teaches drawing for one semester at Southern Methodist University.
  • Brownsville Museum of Fine Art keeps two large-scale paintings for its permanent collection.

2020 – Beda moves his studio to a new location in Mesquite, TX.

  • Exhibitions are postponed and canceled due to COVID-19.

For more information about Bartosz Beda visit here.