Eric Orr, 58; Innovative Venice Painter, Sculptor

Eric Orr, the Southern California light and space artist who painted and sculpted with such unlikely materials as gold, dust, dry ice, fire, lead and his own blood, has died. He was 58.

Orr died early Friday of a heart attack in his combination studio and home in Venice, assistant Sophie Chahinian said Tuesday.

Along with Los Angeles artists Larry Bell, Robert Irwin, Doug Wheeler and James Turrell, Orr pioneered the light and space genre of modern art in the late 1960s and ‘70s. His first installation manipulating light and space was “Animated Hog” at the Pasadena Art Museum in 1966.

Orr earned acclaim with his installation “Silence and the Ion Wind” at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1980, a calming environment he re-created as “Electrum” in 1996 at Fred Hoffman Fine Art in Santa Monica.

The only child of a Kentucky horse breeder, Orr dabbled in marketing, economics and the history of philosophy as he moved in and out of five universities. He had no formal training in art but became interested as a hitchhiker who happened into Philadelphia’s Arensberg collection of modern art.

After moving to Los Angeles in 1965, he was further intrigued by an outdoor sculpture called “Peace Tower” under construction by Mark Di Suvero in West Hollywood. Orr hired on as a welder and soon met others in the arts community who encouraged him.

“I love late afternoon light filtered through trees and dancing on the wall--that’s just devastating,” Orr told The Times in 1996. “A pattern of light flickering on a wall is as beautiful as any painting we can put there.”

“Saturday Night Special,” which featured an unloaded gun, was inspired by the anti-war sentiment of the 1960s and invited the viewer to sit in a chair facing the gun and press a foot pedal, causing the gun to discharge. Orr said the work involved “a trust system”--believing that the artist would not load the weapon.

One of Orr’s most widely visible works was light beamed in 1991 from the top of Long Beach’s Landmark Square. In 1995, he won a contest sponsored by the Cal State Long Beach Art Museum to build a sculpture on campus that he titled “Monument to the First Woman President.” Orr had also created massive works, such as solar fountains, across the United States and Europe.

Orr and his wife, Peggy, had two children.