05/04/2024
Hello from a starving artist:
I have always heard, if you need help ASK, but is help a free gift? NO, I feel you can ask for help only after you have done all you can for yourself , but you keep doing because the help you ask for might not come or it might not come in the way you are asking. I am 56 years old and have always worked hard for a living as a welder. I started my trade in 1970 at 17. I need to go to 1984 so there will be an understanding as to why I need HELP.
I have always had a love for art from the 4th grade drawing cartoons out of the Disney book, it was a fun pass time and over the years this love for art stayed with me, but only as a hobby I was a welder working in the ship yards.
In 1984 I saw the work of Russ Hanson, who was a substitute teacher for Cornish College of The Arts in Seattle WA. I got a chance to show him some of my work which looked like cartoons compared to his, but he must have seen something in me or my work because he said to my surprise “I’m going to teach you how to draw.” We became very good friends. I stuck to him like glue. Russ said to me one day “you are the most persistent student I have ever had.” Russ would give me an assignment that was to take two or three days. I would finish it over night. I could not stop and would work on a drawing or graphic painting for ten to fifteen hours, what a joy, Russ was a Seattle Native Indian and it showed in his work. I fell in love with the Native American and wild life arts, on the disk is work in graphic as I was being trained by Russ Hanson, the color & air-brush work is what I do today.
t was in July 23-1987 a friend and I were coming from Seattle WA to Vancouver WA in his 4x4 truck, there was a accident to which two people lost their lives and I lost my left arm leaving me paralyzed on the upper left side of my body with spinal cord damage , I was not married at that time but all I could thank about was how I was going to make a living with one arm. Depression was something I had never felt only heard about, but now I knew what it felt like. I had no idea how I was going to take care of myself with one arm & hand. Russ was my strong hold with the training he had gave me I applied it to the Air-Brush painting T– Shirts
In 1997 I moved in with my sister and her husband Cindy & Tony King, who had a ostrich ranch in Callands,VA out side of Chatham, VA. In 1997 at my church I met a lady named Cheryl Pritchett. We dated for a year, one day she touched my left nub and said “this don't matter to me.” She must have known how ugly I felt having one arm. I ask her to marry me soon after that , she said yes. Cheryl is a joy in my life still today and has been a great helped when painting T-Shirts at the Danville VA fair, and many street festivals over the years.
Today I’m a Air Brush artist doing Automotive murals , you can view my work at www.facebook.com/vaair55
Art work shown is 18"diameter done with Graphite , Using A Laser Printing process to produces a High Quality Print , The 3 shown are ready $150 each "no frame
