* All images used with permission. Please do not distribute without first contacting the artist.
Herb Roe was born and spent his childhood in the Appalachian regions of Southern Ohio and Northeastern Kentucky. In 2007 Roe began to pursue a career as a fine artist, specializing in fine art oil paintings depicting the history and culture of his adopted home in South Louisiana’s Acadiana region.
Herb describes his work by saying, “My work focuses on depicting the relevance of traditional communal and community building events such as the boucherie and the Courir de Mardi Gras. The majority of this focus has been on the “courir”, the traditional pre-Lenten celebration of the Prairie Cajuns of southwest Louisiana, an entire day of masked revelry with its roots in the ancient Roman Lupercalia and Saturnalia. The participants don elaborate costumes drawn from medieval traditions, frontier era depictions of Native Americans and political and social commentary; costumes meant to simultaneously conceal ones identity and through the temporary repeal of societal inhibitions display their inner selves.”
