Matilda Essig grew up in the eastern woodland of Pennsylvania, in a world full of art and agriculture. She received her BA from Reed College and trained in classical painting and drawing at the Art Students League of New York. After 10 years working in Natural Science Illustration in the Sonoran Desert, she returned to fine art with the tools of the future and began to use digital imaging technology to explore the subtle diversity of open space in the American West. Inspired both by the beauty of grasslands and by her perceptual experiences in traditional illustration, she now portrays her subjects with a fidelity that transcends her own hand. Her work is in private and corporate collections, national parks, and wildlife refuges throughout the American Southwest. Her clientele has included Dr. Jane Goodall, National Geographic, the US Department of the Interior, and Oxford University Press, among others. She lives on five acres of grasslands that she restored in the Apache Highlands of southeast Arizona. She keeps a traditional painting studio too.
CURRICULUM VITAE
EDUCATION
Institute for Electronic Arts, Alfred University. Residency 2007
Reed College, Portland OR. Bachelors in Fine Art & Anthropology 1983
Art Students League of New York. Classical painting technique 1986
Nelson Shanks, Portraitist, Andalusia PA (studied with) 1989
Frank Golhke, Photographer (studied with) 1979
Sterling College, “The Grassroots Project in Vermont” 1977
SELECT EXHIBITIONS
2019 Native Grasses of the Apache Highlands – National Willa Cather Museum, Red Cloud NE (solo)
2019 Native Grasses of the Apache Highlands Desert Caballeros Western Museum, Wickenberg AZ (solo)
2019 Flower Power, Triangle L Ranch, Oracle AZ (group)
2017-2018 Native Grasses of the Apache Highlands – Tucson Airport, Center Gallery (solo)
2015-2016 Native Grasses of the Apache Highlands – Amerind Museum, Dragoon AZ (solo)
2015-2016 Welcome to the American West – Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson AZ (group)
2015 Typology and Morphology, Institute for Electronic Arts, Alfred University, andT & H Gallery, Boston MA2014
2014 Putting Grasslands to Work – digital exhibition for Savory Institute, HRM Conference, London, ENG
2013 Desert Grasslands, Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson AZ (group)
2011 Galleria de Viaggio, Sonoita AZ (solo)
2011 Drawn From Nature – John James Audubon Center, Mill Grove PA (group)
2011 Western Arts Day – Grand Canyon North Rim (solo)
2010 The Prairie Festival –The Land Institute, Salina KS (solo)
2009 Western Arts Day – Grand Canyon North Rim (solo)
2009 Verve Gallery of Photography, Santa Fe NM (three person exhibition)
2009 Below The Surface: A Natural History of the Prairie, – Faulconer Gallery, Grinnell Iowa
2009 Reflections on the Land, Diablo Trust at Northern Arizona University Flagstaff AZ
2009 Empire Ranch Roundup, Northern Trust Bank, Tucson AZ
1999 Portraits of the Elders – Cochise College, Sierra Vista, AZ
1996-2001 The Sonoran People’s Tapestry Project, traveling exhibit in Arizona and Mexico (trinational collaboration)
1996-2000 Desert Stories Traveling Exhibit, commissioned by the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, designed and curated by Matilda Essig
1994-1996 Reality Check – Juried Traveling Exhibition of Contemporary Realism, sponsored by the Arizona Commission for the Arts
AWARDS and GRANTS
2011 Distinguished Alumnae Award, The Baldwin School, Bryn Mawr PA
2007 NEA Residency Grant, Institute for Electronic Arts, Alfred Univ.,Hornell NY 2006
2006 Professional Development Grant, Arizona Commission for the Arts
2002 Professional Development Grant, Arizona Commission for the Arts
1999 Professional Development Grant, Arizona Commission for the Arts
1996 Project Stipend, Arizona Humanities Council
1996 Professional Development Grant, Arizona Commission for the Arts
1994 Professional Development Grant, Arizona Commission for the Arts
1992 Professional Development Grant, Arizona Commission for the Arts
SELECT CLIENTS
Capital Institute
Jane Goodall
World Wildlife Fund
Oxford University Press National Geographic
US Department of the Interior National Park Service
USDA Forest Service
Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument
Cabesa Prieta Wildlife Refuge
Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum
The Land Institute
Arizona Land and Water Trust & Pima County
The Nature Conservancy
Drylands Institute
Sonoran Institute
Empire Ranch
C6 Ranch
47 Ranch
CrossCreek Ranch
Grindstone Cattle Company
Drum Hadley
CORPORATE and MUSEUM COLLECTIONS
The Tucson Museum of Art
John James Audubon Museum, Mill Grove PA
The Berwind Corporation, Philadelphia PA
Snell and Wilmer, Phoenix AZ
Bank One – Phoenix AZ
MacDonald’s Corporation, Oakbrook IL
American Continental Properties, NYC World headquarters
General Plasma Corporation, Tucson AZ
The Bowman Stradling Historical Museum, Sonoita AZ
FOLIO PLACEMENTS in UNIVERSITY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
PUBLICATIONS
Capital Institute’s Feildguide to a Regenerative Economy
‘Portraits of Grass: A Story of Art and Restoration from the Apache Highlands Ecoregion’. Ecological Restoration Volume 26, Number 3, test and illustrations by Matilda Essig, University of Wisconsin Press, 2008
The Land Report, Summer 2010. cover and illustrations by Matilda Essig.
Below the Surface: A 21st Century Look at the Prairie. 2009. catalogue from the exhibition, written by Lesley Wright.
Trees of Sonora, by Richard Felger, including illustrations by Matilda Essig, Oxford University Press, 2000
The Ancestress Hypothesis: Visual Art as Adaptation, by Kathryn Coe, illustrations by Matilda Essig, Rutgers University Press 2003
Desert Communities Teacher’s Guide, illustrations by Matilda Essig, published by Saguaro National Park. 1998
‘Among the Gifts of Native America’, Native People’s Magazine 1992. Story by Jack Weatherford, Photos by Matilda Essig.
‘Belgian Belgian Draft Horses’, Small Farmer’s Journal Vol 3, #3. 1979. Story and photos by Matilda Essig.
