Mural artist Eric Hornsby, known as esh, has put his work on The Cube in the Jaeb Courtyard for a few years. Now he gathers some of the area’s premier mural artists to open a brand new Art on the Walk exhibit during our Open House Party on Oct. 6.
Caught in the Act recently sat down with aerosol artist (a.k.a. medium of choice is spray paint) and friend of The Straz Eric Hornsby to find out more details about his story, his artistic process and the upcoming Art on the Walk exhibit that features him and other great Tampa-area mural artists Eddie Rivera, zeros, the Capco crew and reda3sb. Together, they’re installing panels of mural art inspired by people and places of Tampa during our annual free festival, the Open House Party, on Oct. 6.
Eric’s roots in Florida go deep, starting when his family moved to Thonotosassa from the northeast after his grandfather, a retired New York police officer, bought a mobile home park in that rural area of Hillsborough County. “I have to give a lot of props to my Uncle Joe who passed away two, three years ago,” Eric says. “He had a canoe, and we didn’t even have to ask, we’d just borrow it. Literally walk five miles with the thing on our back to the lake and paddle out. I was a nature lover from the go. Living like Huckleberry Finn out there for real. We made homemade bows and arrows; we’d just camp out and cook anything we shot. We ate all that stuff. I used to swim from Sargent’s Park to Morris Bridge, that part of the Hillsborough River, for the adventure of it. Alligator-infested water,” he laughs.
Eric’s upbringing in the Florida woods led to his first career in the wilderness, first as a canoe guide, then as a park ranger, then to his job as an on-site land manager for Hillsborough County’s conservation department. Wild as he was in this career, he kept returning to his first love: art. Mostly self-taught by emulating manga, cartoon styles and comic books, Eric’s artistic style, a mash up of those styles with lurid nature symbolism, evolved. He wanted to be a professional artist, and the time came for him to put up or shut up.
“I read a book by Tim Ferris. Somewhere he says, ‘if you’re not doing the things you love …” essentially meaning if you’re not choosing the life you want, you’re living a false life. I was like, ‘I can’t live a false life!’ It really hit me hard, so I started moving from point A to point B, reading a lot of books to motivate me to do what I wanted to do,” says Eric. He dropped down to part time and focused on becoming a professional artist.
“Eat, Sleep, Hustle,” or esh for short, emerged.
To hear Eric speak more in-depth about his transformation and about when you can meet him and the other artists at The Straz, plug into Act2, the Straz Center’s official podcast. Our interview with Eric goes live on Thursday, 9/27/18. During the interview, we discuss his work outside of The Cube, including the paintings and murals pictured above.
We’ve included a few favorites from The Cube that you may remember below.
Come meet Eric at our Open House Party with the other mural artists (samples of their art pictured below) and remember to catch his interview on Act2.
