An Article on My Work

I love to cook, play the guitars, and paint.  While I was an undergraduate at  Columbia University studying mechanical engineering, I was selected for exhibition at the Family Weekend (I duked it out with a bunch of art students for the spot).   Below is the nice article that they wrote up about me. The text in the article is a bit hard to read, and it has been added after the image so that you can make sense of it.

Text from the above article:

The story of Eli Greenblatt’s (SEA ’07) journey into the art world is one that provides a snapshot into the world of the well-rounded Columbia University student. Using inner passion and a delicate eye, this mechanical engineering Student defies stereotypes normally associated with engineers and produces masterpieces worthy of all praise.

Eli got his start painting when he got into an involved discussion with his friends mother, a painter, regarding art. Mistaking him for an artist, the mother sent Eli copied of her work, asking to see his in return. Having nothing, he began a portrait using oil pastel on a shirt cardboard, and in Eli’s own words, “much to my own surprise it came out quite wonderfully.”

Four years ago, the Lawrence, New York native made his first attempt at oil on canvas, the “Resolute Self Portrait ‘01” (featured).  Intending to capture the unquestioning lucidity of the devout lifestyle, Greenblatt painted this piece in the fading sunlight of a late Jerusalem afternoon.

Eli’s other featured work is his most recent completion, “The Peppercorn Rabbi”, which was completed in August ’05. This piece is the third and most poignant number in a series of portraits of the same rabbi. Greenblatt describes this work as “a study of charisma, specifically of how charisma seems to be such an important catalyst independent of particular dogma.” Elis’s inspiration for this portrait came from personal contact with the rabbi, who had “the mischievous spirit of freshly crushed peppercorns.”  

One of Elis’s unfeatured works in one his describes as his most honest creations, entitled “Unclothed Self Portrait ’04.” The artist places themes including personal paradox, strength and weakness, light and darkness, and art and science in sharp contrast in this piece. Greenblatt’s motivation for this self portrait was developed though strong personal dichotomies Eli felt during that period. In, addition, Eli paints in a variety of different styles including (but certainly not limited to) existentialist essentialism, surrealism, and portraiture. One of Greenblatts’s crowning glories is that he has never – to his knowledge- employed the same painting technique more than once.

Eli Greenblatts is one of the many examples of Columbia University’s commitment to seeking out students with diverse interests and talents. In addition to painting as an expression of inner emotion and perception of others, Eli sells lithographs of his works to help ameliorate the costs of attending Columbia University in the City of New York.

-Courtney Wilikins

The Peppercorn Rabbi

I painted (oils on  canvas) professionally for a while. Here is one of my favorite paintings of the late Rabbi Shlomo Friefeld, my father's mischievous Rebbe:

Several More Paintings

Click through the gallery below.

Some Other Interesting Facts About Me 

• Love to cook.  Really, really love to cook (Winner MIT Iron Chef Competition 2013)
• Submitted the largest number of invention disclosures in one week in MIT history (18)
• Working on an application that simulates romantic relationships using differential equations 
• Defended my PhD on December 15th, 2014 in the historical Ether Dome at Massachusetts General Hospital
• Produced more than 12 large events as Social Chair at MIT (with 200- 450 students in attendance, all with fresh food from scratch!)
• Was a wilderness counselor for 5 summers out on the West Coast
• Born in 1981, been in school pretty much from the age of 3
• Studied in a rabbinical seminary in Jerusalem for 3 years
• My middle name is Eliyahu

___________________________________

Contact

eeg@alum.mit.edu