As an artist, Vicksburg native Andrew Bucci has mastered the hues, shades and saturation of the color spectrum. As a legatee of praise and accolades, he deflects the spotlight.

When the 86-year-old was nominated for the Mississippi Arts Commission Lifetime Achievement Award a few years ago, he asked to be removed from consideration. When he was nominated again for the 2009 award and selected, he reluctantly agreed.

“It’s something I don’t really want. I’ve been out of the state for so long, and there’s many other people more deserving of the award than me,” said Bucci. “I wish they hadn’t chosen me.”

An awards ceremony for the Governor’s Awards for Excellence in the Arts will take place Feb. 26, 2009, at Galloway United Methodist Church in downtown Jackson. Along with Bucci, Mississippi musicians, authors, schools and galleries will be honored, including musician Cassandra Wilson and author John Grisham. The ceremony is open to the public and there is no admission fee.

Bucci has lived in the Washington, D.C,. area since 1956, but still considers himself a visitor at his Fort Washington, Md., home.

“I feel like I’m a Mississippian, for better or worse,” he said with a laugh, adding he is considering moving back to Vicksburg. “I did more down there than I have ever done here.”

He took his first art class at All Saints’ Episcopal School in Vicksburg under the direction of impressionist Mary Clare Sherwood — whom Bucci noted would have been a much better choice for an award than himself. In the 1930s, he began studying with Marie Hull in Jackson and continued to do so after he want to college at Louisiana State University to study architecture and engineering. He also took some courses at New York University before going to France to serve as a meteorologist in World War II. His service there provided him the opportunity to study at the Académie Julian in Paris.

Upon returning from the war, Bucci enrolled at the Art Institute of Chicago, where he received a bachelor’s degree in fine art in 1952 and a master’s degree in 1954. He looked for work as an art instructor, but said nobody would hire him, so he went to work for the weather bureau in Washington — which he eventually retired from in 1979.

“I worked rotating shifts, and we’d get about three days off in a row during the week,” recalled Bucci of the years in which he had his most artwork featured in galleries. “I had an apartment with an extra room which I used as a studio, but I never really rang the big bells.”

Bucci’s paintings have been featured in galleries all over the country, such as the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, The Concoran Gallery of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. His work continues to be featured in galleries in Jackson and New Orleans. His most well known works are oil paintings, which Bucci described as having “some degree of abstraction, but underneath have some realistic idea.”

“His artwork is so powerful. He is such and individualist, and such an interesting visual artist,” said Susan Dobbs, public relations director for the Mississippi Arts Commission. “He’s been all over the world, but he still loves Mississippi, still visits and still shows his work here.”

One of Bucci’s two brothers still lives in Vicksburg, as do many of his nieces, nephews and cousins. The son of an Italian immigrant and a Vicksburg native, Bucci grew up on First North Street. His father worked as a tailor in Vicksburg, but first operated small haberdashery shops in New York and Kentucky after arriving in the United States in 1904.

The Mississippi Arts Commission has been recognizing artists from the state with the Governor’s Awards for Excellence in the Arts for 21 years, with past recipients of the Lifetime Achievement Award including author Elizabeth Spencer and musicians Bo Diddly and Charley Pride.

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Contact Steve Sanoski at ssanoski@vicksburgpost.com.