What really ignited this passion for painting was his exposure to mentor Wolf Kahn through the Santa Fe Institute Of Fine Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico as part of the Masters Art Program. Over time Bechtold has built a solid reputation for being a major contributor to the on going dialog in contemporary landscape painting in the mid west and beyond. His work is expressed with energy, painted with seemingly effortless brushwork and charged with color. All connected by place and moment.
His paintings, some monumental in size, have been seen in solo and featured exhibitions in museums and prominent galleries as well as public and private collections across the United States. Bechtold and his wife, botanical illustrator Glory Bechtold, live and work near Chicago and in Door County Wisconsin.
