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Member's Gallery: Bert Seabourn
"My name has long been associated with being a Native American painter and/or a painter of Indians. I think of myself as an American expressionist who sometimes paints Indians and sometimes paints non-Indians and sometimes paints landscapes and sometimes paints flowers. I think of an expressionist as a painter who expresses himself with the honest use of paint...meaning..it drips, it smears, it splatters, it runs...it does all these things." Painter and printmaker, Bert Seabourn (b. 7-9-1931), has experimented extensively with graphic media, gouache, watercolor, acrylics and oils for over fifty years. He continues to exhibit throughout the United States and has shown his art in England, Germany, France, Russia, Taiwan, Singapore, Chile, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia and Ecuador. His work is not only in private collections world wide, but is also in many public collections such as
He has earned more than 100 top awards at art competitions nationwide. Other honors include 1975 Master Artist title bestowed by the Five Civilized Museum, Muskogee, OK; the Governor's Art Award in 1981, presented by Governor George Nigh, Oklahoma State Capitol, Oklahoma City, OK; and in 1986, Seabourn's "Windwalker", a 23' tall, bronze sculpture, was unveiled at the state headquarters for Southwestern Bell in Oklahoma City. One of the highest and most recent honors
is the Doctor of Humane Letters honorary Degree bestowed
upon Seabourn In August, 1997, by Dr. Gerald Walker at Oklahoma City
University, where Seabourn had earned his certificate of art many
years earlier. "I was born in Iraan, TX, July 9, 1931, and sold my first piece of art (a cartoon) in 1946. I was in the eighth grade at Purcell, OK, and the cartoon was published by Kingfisher Features Syndicate. I graduated from Purcell High School in 1950 and married my high school sweetheart , Bonnie Jo Tompkins, in July of that year. In March of 1951, I joined the Navy and our first daughter, Connie, was born in September. I shipped out of Treasure Island, CA, and sailed to Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii, in December of 1952, and awaited further orders. I was assigned to Navy Air Transport Squadron Eight as an artist, and was stationed at Hickam Air Force Base. My next duty station was CincPac Fleet, at Pearl Harbor, also as an artist. In 1953, Bonnie and Connie joined me in Honolulu, and in May, 1954, our daughter, Angela, was born at Tripler Army Hospital. In March, 1995, I received my discharge from the Navy and we moved to Oklahoma City. I started to work for Oklahoma Gas and Electric that year and enrolled in night classes that fall at Oklahoma City University with art as my major, graduating in 1963. In 1964*, I completed a correspondence course in Commercial Art and Illustration from the Famous Artist Schools of Westport, CT. In 1978, I quit my job at OG&E, after 23 years as artist/art director, to pursue a full time career as a painter of fine art." *note from editor: A third daughter, Jimmie Denise, born in 1963,was adopted by Bert and Bonnie in 1965. Seabourn says, "Bonnie and I felt it was an honor to meet with President Ford and his wife, Betty, and present them with a watercolor. The meeting was very private, except for the secret service, and we found the Fords to be fine people. I also gave them my first suite of four works and felt pleased that I was the artist selected for the meeting." Seabourn was making art from a very early
age, and his first cartoon sale was at the age of thirteen. He continued
to draw and paint at every opportunity. As a teenager, when he would
hear of an art show in a city of any "reasonable" traveling
distance, he would "hop a train" and be off to see the
exhibit. The following is a quote from the
catalogue for that show "I personally selected a number of varied works from my wife's (Bonnie) collection and my own personal collection. Some are well known because of the posters and the limited prints that have been printed, and others are known only to us.* "I look forward to seeing this
exhibit spanning 35 years. It will be like seeing loved ones I haven't
seen in years. My thanks to the Kilpatrick Center and the volunteer
staff. My thanks also to the wonderful people who have paid hard earned
dollars in buying and collecting my work." "After forty plus years of making my
living doing art work, I relate very well to the following words: Seabourn's best-known works provide us with a dream-like glimpse into the souls of all living things, in a spiritual, impressionistic style. His paintings depict the things he loves, such as women holding babies; wise, old men; the four-leggeds as story tellers; and the birds as messengers. He shares with the viewers some special moments, possibly in a new light, like lovers walking along the bank of a rusty creek or among the persimmon trees; lovers galloping off "in the fast lane" toward a passionately red sky; or children who still remember how to talk with the animals. He paints the healers and mystics, the ones who care for our bodies and souls. Sometimes these shamans are painted with serious reverence and sometimes with Seabourn's characteristic sense of humor...he has been known to paint the shaman carrying his "medicine" inside a martini glass, complete with olive. Whatever the subject, Seabourn's work does provide our world with more art, love and magic!
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