About Lonnie Powell

Lonnie Powell is a graduate of Lincoln University, Jefferson  City, Missouri where he was privileged to study under the guidance of  the late James Dallas Parks whose influence spread well beyond the  sphere of art.

Powell’s occupations have ranged from dishwasher at the Villa  Capri Restaurant to Xerox Executive Sales Representative, but the vast  majority of his career was as an art teacher in the Kansas City,  Missouri School District.

Though he is not presently a member, Powell is a charter  board member and a past board president of The Black Archives of  Mid-America and a co-founder of Euphrates Gallery. He is a past  president of the Friends of Bruce R. Watkins Culture Heritage Center.  Powell is the founder and past president of The Light in the Other Room,  a collaborative of African-American, Kansas City based artists.

Powell has shown in and around his beloved city of Kansas  City, Missouri in many venues including solo and group exhibits at  Ethnic Art Gallery, The Central Exchange, Bruce R. Watkins Cultural  Heritage Center and Museum, American Jazz Museum’s Changing Gallery, The  Vine Street Studio, The 18th Street Studio, The Review Studio and many  others.

He has exhibited at a number of area colleges and  universities including Park University, Parkville, Missouri; Western  Missouri University, St. Joseph, Missouri; Lincoln University, Jefferson  City, Missouri; Rockhurst University, Kansas City, Missouri where he  spent a year (1969-1970) as artist in residence;  The University of  Central Missouri, Warrensburg, Missouri;  Avila College, Kansas City,  Missouri;  William Jewell College, Liberty, Missouri; and Kansas  University Medical Center, Kansas City, Kansas.

Powell has had art accepted in competitions at The Portfolio  Gallery, St. Louis, Missouri; The Atlanta Life Insurance Company’s  African-American National Art Competition and Exhibition, Atlanta,  Georgia; The Black Arts Festival, Dayton, Ohio; The Plaza Art Fair,  Kansas City, Missouri; The National Watercolor Society, Brea,  California; and The St. Louis Art Fair, Clayton, Missouri.

His art is in numerous private collections, as well as  corporate and museum collections including: Sprint Corporation, H & R  Block Corporation, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Fishnet  Corporation, Andrews/McMeel Universal, Sports Association Management,  Inc., Truman Medical Center, Kansas City Chiefs Arrowhead Art Collection  and permanent collections at The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum,  American Jazz Museum, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, and Mulvane Art  Museum.

He has art in The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum’s traveling exhibition, Shades of Greatness, which tours galleries and museums across the country.

Powell is a Signature Member of The National Watercolor Society and his award winning watercolor, South Sun, toured the country in 2006 with The National Watercolor Society’s 85th Annual Traveling Exhibition.

Powell was named one of the “Ones to Watch” by Watercolor  Magic Magazine in the December 2006 issue. In December of 2007, he  traveled with members of Change the Truth to Kajjansi, Uganda to give a  series of art workshops for children of St. Mary Kevin’s Orphanage.

In October 2013, Powell won “Best of Show” in Harlem X-Hibit on Black Art in America.

Missouri Congressman Emanuel Cleaver, II and his wife, Dianne  Cleaver, honored Powell with a Congressional Record Statement for his  artistic contributions to the community and country in April 2015.

Powell received the ArtsKC Virtuoso Award in February 2020  for his volunteerism, his artistic contributions and his work within  arts education and the Kansas City arts community as a whole.