Ernie Barnes

In 1984, the American Sport Art Museum and Archives (ASAMA), in conjunction with the United States Sports Academy, began presenting its Sport Artist of the Year Award to "individuals who capture the spirit and life of sport so that future generations can relive the drama of today's competition." There could not have been a better inaugural recipient than Ernie Barnes.

Barnes is a virile symbol of the American Dream. Raised on a dirt street in Durham, North Carolina, he evolved from a shy, sensitive child artist to a pro football lineman, holding a cumulative six-year National Football League career with the Denver Broncos and San Diego Chargers.

"One day on the playing field, I looked up and the sun was breaking through, hitting the unmuddied areas on the uniforms, and I said, 'That's beautiful!' I knew then it was all over being a player. I was more interested in art. So, I traded my cleats for canvas, my bruises for brushes, and put all the violence and power I had felt on the field into my paintings."

After leaving football, he moved to Los Angeles in 1967 and opened a studio in West Hollywood, steadily increasing his exhibitions and placement of originals with the most discerning collectors. In 1973, the High Memorial Museum in Atlanta honored him with his first one-man show, only to be followed by the North Carolina Museum of Art in 1974. Other private exhibitions have been hosted by Mrs. Ethel Kennedy, Representative Jack Kemp, Charlton Heston, Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley and hotelier Barron Hilton.

It was this ground swell of political, cultural and celebrity support that won Barnes the highly distinguished honor as Official Artist of the 1984 XXIII Olympiad. That same year, he was honored as ASAMA's first-ever "Artist of the Year."

What makes Barnes in such demand is the fact that he has had the courage and versatility to be an original thinker, using everyday life as a valid subject for art. He can easily go from a work of sensational force and power — as in his three runners stretching for the finish ribbon in "First, Second & Third" — to images of extreme delicacy and sophistication portrayed by a couple dancing alone in a shack to the music of an old radio in "The Anniversary."

Simply, Barnes has tapped into man's daily experience and made it a grand one. Much of Barnes' career has been committed to producing works of art that accentuate humanity in all its glory. In his hands, a paintbrush has become a powerful tool in provoking, enlightening and inspiring a deeper understanding of the world we all inhabit and share, regardless of cultural and ethnical differences. His work continues to gain critical acclaim and collector strength through Manhattan's prestigious Grand Central Art Galleries.

He and his wife Bernie, live in a quiet section of greater Los Angeles, where he works in his home studio.