COUNTRY ROADS

This scene is uniquely rural. Driving the country roads of rural America you encounter this friendliness. Each stranger you meet has their own distinct manner of waving. Exhibited: Blue Cloud Abbey, Meredith Corporation, Bruce R. Watkins Cultural Heritage Center

40 inches x 26 inches cm
Pastel
Figurative, Realist

Since 1964, Roy E. Burgess has painted the people, the life and the cultures of the plains of America. The artist’s inaugural museum exhibition was Rural Roots, a series of painting of farmers and small town people. In the mid to late 1980’s, the Rural Roots Rural was viewed in art museums in America and Russia. Burgess follows President Eisenhower’s belief that one on one relating among people could solve most problems in the world.

Burgess returned to Russia in the early 1990’s with his latest museum exhibition Urban Roots. These paintings portray city people. After a three-year tour of art museums in Russia the exhibition returned to America in 1996.

After the Urban Roots opening in Russia, Burgess had a chance encounter with a Benedictine monk from Blue Cloud Abbey; a monastery dedicated to serving in the Indian people in the Dakotas. Six months later Burgess was living with 35 monks.

Dakota and Black Robes are the third and fourth museum exhibitions created by Burgess. Dakota is about the Native American people of South and North Dakota. Burgess researched and painted the Indians during his two years as artist-in-residence at Blue Cloud Abbey. Black Robes is about the monks he lived with during his residency at the monastery.

In the late 90’s, Burgess moved to the West Indies to research the 82 nationalities living in Caribbean Islands. Returning to America, the artist is designing and painting the Caribbean series in Excelsior Springs, Missouri.



Roy E. Burgess’s latest series is called “OHANA”, which means “extended family” in the Hawaiian language. The paintings tell the stories of the Native Hawaiian people and their culture. The Ritz Carlton at Kapalua, Maui as presenting sponsor will premier the “OHANA” exhibit on the Hawaiian Island in the Fall of 2006. The paintings will be exhibited for three months at the Ritz Carlton or the Maui Arts and Cultural Center. At the end of the exhibit the paintings will be sold on eBay to raise funds for a charity serving the Native Hawaiian people.