Roy Boney

Artist Biography

Roy Boney, Jr. (Cherokee Nation) is from Locust Grove, OK, and currently resides in Tahlequah. He is an award winning multimedia artist and writer. His art has been exhibited across the United States and internationally. He holds a BFA in Graphic Design from Oklahoma State University and Master of Art in Studio Art from the University of Arkansas – Little Rock. 

In addition to making fine art, he works as graphic novelist and illustrator. Some of his titles include Dead Eyes Open, Trickster: Native American Tales, Tales of the Mighty Code Talkers, and Moonshot. He has contributed articles on Indigenous art and culture to various publications including Indian Country Today, Native Peoples, the Cherokee Phoenix, and First American Art. Currently, he works for the Cherokee Nation Department of Language as a program manager where he works extensively in making the Cherokee language useable in technology. 

An extensive list of his exhibitions, publications, and presentations can be found at www.royboneyart.com.

Artist Statement

Indigenous people are often pigeonholed into stereotypes, seemingly never living past the 19th century. Cherokees often bear the brunt of this kind of colonial mindset as non-Natives sometimes try to make claims of being Cherokee based on false family mythologies and the inaccurate and ignorant views promulgated by American popular culture. My ultimate goal as an artist is create art that subverts these views while expressing the Cherokee experience in contemporary life. Despite the many inaccuracies perpetuated by American pop culture through media like comics and film, I grew up as an avid consumer of these kinds of media images. My tastes in and influences from genres like horror, sci-fi, hip hop, and rock and roll are incorporated with Cherokee language and history, resulting in imagery that is infused by modern media culture, both highbrow and lowbrow. Ultimately, coming from a background of comics illustration and animation, my art is that of a Cherokee storyteller. Sometimes these are narrative stories like comic books and animated stories while others are paintings, drawings, prints, and digital imagery. Whatever form they take, I hope consumers of my work realize we are 21st Century people, too.

@royboney

Roy’s work was included in our group exhibition, Post POP, on view September 28, 2021 - January 31, 2022.