Elizabeth sees herself an “elder artist” having spent her life acquiring aesthetic wisdom working both as an artist and a facilitator of art making. Having said that, her art making is inquisitive, vibrant and youthful. She is a dedicated defender of art and artists as essential to, a just world of opportunities, divergent views, and critical discussions that bring about change.
Elizabeth was educated in the fine arts in US, Mexico, and Canada, where she studied film making and serigraphy. Her work was recognized immediately within a group show at Anthology Archives, NYC, and NY state Guggenheim supported Media Study in Buffalo where she taught a little and was able to work with generous access to equipment. She was part of a video/media show at Mexico City’s Museum of Modern Art, which was being picketed for the foreign content. “My political views really sharpened at this time. I became very critical and intellectual. I was seeing the injustices happening to people everywhere and still do. And for artists, most are still struggling to acquire the basics, to get their work out there, to be validated, to get dollars, so at the very least they can continue working.”
“I was literally starving as an artist, until the opportunity to use my abilities came with my first editorial job in photography in Canada.” Before retiring from editorial magazines, she was the Creative Photography Director of Newsweek in NYC; a professional career that spanned Canada and the US. “Film and experimental video were an important influence in the commissioning of photographers for all the assignments. I worked hard to challenge the tired aesthetics in publishing, and I got bored with repetition.”
After leaving the editorial field in 2000, she moved from Brooklyn, NY to her Midwest roots, which she describes laughingly as “a horrible idea.” While participating with her family as her mother’s illness progressed, she returned to her fine art roots and created 26 large BW fine art prints. The work was published in Applied Arts, Canada’s premium Art glossy pub in 2010. The story head was “A former magazine photo director picks up a camera to create an emotionally resonant series…”
Elizabeth will tell you, “If you want a rich life, you must take some risks and break some rules. Be bold, make room for change in your life, acknowledge and engage death and rebirth cycles, and do healing ceremonies with good people by your side.” She walks her own walk and continues, “We need good teachers to live well. We all know how it feels to be out there with no safety nets. We are now getting back to living, laughing and making art but we know everything is different. We are learning to live differently!”
In 2018 she went to Tahiti and swam with the whales. When Covid hit, Elizabeth started painting. “It surprised me and it felt so good. I needed to have my hands on the materials, feel them. Get back to tangibility and my own truth.”
Lastly, an artist’s statement is needed.
Elizabeth Burroughs describes her art making in personal terms as engaging Light, Energy, and Movement to discuss mystery within personal sacred narratives. The images themselves become the consciousness of those materials impacting her.
She says, “I like words that describe Black Holes, such as “black body radiation.” I like the physicist Nassim Haramein. I like the fact that as humans, we try to discuss galaxy formation, when, in all likelihood, it is a physical state unknowable to humankind. We are learning profound things every day. We are trying to communicate new ideas.”
