Burnside returned to Nassau in 1979 and was an art professor at the
College of The Bahamas until 1990. Burnside's artistic creations outside of Junkanoo employ the exuberance and colors of the cultural celebration. In 1985, Burnside and his brother Jackson collaborated on
Faces, a sculptural painting. Burnside characterized the work as a continuation of the art they had created through Junkanoo, saying "It was our attempt to take the process, the Junkanoo collaborative process, into the painting studio." In 1991, Burnside joined with five other artists to form B-CAUSE (Bahamian Creative Artists United for Serious Expression). The group, which included his brother Jackson, as well as the artists
Brent Malone, Maxwell Taylor, John Beadle, and
Antonius Roberts, dedicated themselves to the foundation of the
National Art Gallery of The Bahamas and the promotion of a national art school. Burnside, his brother, and Beadle worked together for a season in the Junkanoo shacks before producing the painting series
Jammin I. They founded the artist collective Jammin Roberts and Malone joined the collective in 1993, creating
Jammin II. Burnside-Beadle-Burnside exhibited their works in Atlanta, Georgia, for the
1996 Summer Olympics. They also exhibited
Jammin III in Brazil at the
São Paulo Art Biennial. Burnside later joined with Beadle and Antonius Roberts to continue the Jammin series as Burnside, Beadle & Roberts.
ArtReview called Burnside a "pioneering voice in
Afrofuturism". Burnside was a consult on pageantry for the
2014 IAAF World Relays. Burnside has exhibited in the United States, France, the Dominican Republic, Bermuda, Cuba, Ecuador, and Venezuela. His 2000 oil painting
Solomon commemorates the Bahamian musician
Exuma as
King Solomon and is part of the collection of the National Art Gallery of The Bahamas.
Sideburns Burnside was hired by
The Nassau Guardian to be their
editorial cartoonist in July 1979.
Sideburns cartoons were often single-panelled, featuring characters such as the Shack Rat and the Tourism Goose. After a 40-year run of
Sideburns, including more than 10,000 cartoon panels, His final cartoon was published on 31 July 2019. ==Selected exhibitions==