For fifty years or more, I have been placing images on flat pieces of paper. By conservative estimate, I have covered fifty acres of white paper and in some instances, on canvas, with literally as many pints of paint and ink.

The greatest amount of this output has been as a cartoonist. However, as an extension and overflow of this creative energy and as a lovely recreational activity, I have painted oils and watercolors. More inventive non-objective paintings have become my love in recent years. My name is included in “Who’s Who in American Art”, and “Who’s Who in America”.

Increasingly in recent years since my retirement from the Disney Company where I was a staff artists for many years, I have devoted my creative energies to the art of watercolor painting. Besides the non-objective abstract work, I have addressed the knotty problems such as, the war in Vietnam, crime in the streets, the Laguna fire, etc., in a series of subjects which are usually the province of editorial cartoonists. Many artists in history have done the same. Some role models are Goya, (Disasters de la Guerra), Daumier, Picasso, and more recently, Jack Levine, Robert Gwathmey and William Gropper.

To Quote Rico LeBrun, “The artist must be a scribe to his time.” Hence, the events of the historical period must be filtered through the sensibilities and experience of the artist.

Roger Armstrong has been an active member of the Southern California art community for over 40 years. He is a former director of the Laguna Art Museum and past president of the National Watercolor Society. A graduate of Chouinard Art Institute, he holds an honorary Ph.D. from the Art Institute of Southern California. He is a member of the Pasadena Society of Artists.

Pasadena Society of Artists
2002 April 6-June 16
75th Annual Diamond Jubilee Exhibition,Pasadena Historical Museum, Pasadena CA

Biographic information, photo portrait, and artist’s statement provided by the artist.

“Storm Over Sedona” image from “The National Watercolor Society, 80th Annual Exhibition, November 4- December 31, 2000” Muckenthaler Cultural Center, Fullerton, California.

“Unknown Title” Image from “Recent Paintings by Roger Armstrong” June 21 to August 24, Mountain View Memorial Gallery, Altadena, California.

“Deya, Mallorca, Spain" Image from “the California Romantics, Harbingers of Watercolorism” By Robert Perine, Catalog for National Watercolor Society Past President’s Invitational at the Brand Library, Glendale, California, March 7th to April 7th, 1987 Curated by Nancy Livesay and Robert Perine, Published by Artra Publishing Inc. Copyright 1986.