Born in Argentina in 1940, educated in Denmark and the United States, Erik Speyer has demonstrated a lifelong passion for and commitment to his art. Along with his earlier professional pursuits, as a Navy pilot and museum designer and director, he constantly worked at developing his painting. Speyer is a person of diverse enthusiasms, for art, languages, history, science, travel, cycling, and good conversation. A family man, he has shared his travels and his life with his wife, Jo Beth, their two sons, Andrew and Charles and their grandchildren. Speyer worked exclusively in watercolors until 1997, when he began exploring a different medium, oils. He now finds excitement and fulfillment in both watercolors and oils. Speyer has always been fascinated with the subject of the reflections of color on water, and especially with ships on rivers and in harbors.
Early in his career, Speyer discovered that for him the most satisfying painting was en plein air, where the freshness of the scene may be captured on the spot. An inveterate traveler, he has interpreted the changing nature of light through plein air painting of landscapes and maritime scenes in oils and water colors in such diverse places as Maine, Georgia, California, Florida, Mexico, Argentina and Vietnam. In recent years, Speyer has branched out into portrait as well as still-life painting, but always in his signature impressionistic style.
Select Exhibitions and Awards
2006 Participant, annual juried National Art Exhibit, Punta Gorda, FL
2006 Participant, annual juried The Best and the Brightest show, Scottsdale, AZ
2005 Prize Winner, Raymart National Juried Competition
2005 Winner, One Ear Society Plein Air competition, Coconut Grove, FL
2005 Participant, annual juried American Landscapes Exhibit (oil painting), Annapolis, MD
2005 Participant, annual juried Mystic International Maritime Exhibition (oil paintings), Mystic Seaport, CT
2004 Prize Winner, Miami Watercolor Society annual exhibit, Miami, FL
2003 Prize Winner, Miami Watercolor Society annual exhibit, Miami, FL
2001 The Americas Collection, Coral Gables, FL 1997 Northern Trust Bank, Miami, FL
1991 Brickell Gallery, Miami, FL 1
978 Forma Gallery, Coral Gables, FL
1974 Planet Ocean, Miami, FL 1968 Officer’s Club, Naval Station, Rota, Spain
1964 John Brown’s Gallery, Pensacola, FL
Select Private and Corporate Collections
Northern Trust Bank, Nations Bank, Wackenhut Corporation, Richard Hunt and Associates, Sun Trust, Swiss Bank Corporation, Deutsch Suedamericanisce Bank, Heinz Corporation, Jaymont Corporation, Steel Hector Davis, Botanical Development, The United Way, Prudential, Doral Golf Resort and Spa, Fisher Island, University of Miami, and Federal Courthouse Miami.