Bird Espies Mayfly

2010

Trent Burleson received his MFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design, where he has taught since 1974. His paintings of birds were the subject of an exhibition at the Newport Art Museum in 2011. These birds are not ornithologically accurate, nor expressionist, but fall into the realm of the classically ordered work that characterized the Renaissance and other later art movements in which the formal nature of the canvas prevailed. "Composition, structure and geometry" is what Burleson declares his work is about. His use of chiaroscuro, in which the gradations of light and dark determine the forms, is masterful. His subjects, although representational, are removed from reality by the presence of this unearthly light.

Oil on canvas

frame: 32 in x 32 in; canvas: 30 in x 30 in

Gift of the artist

2011.015.001