lance armstrong painting: sketches & concepts

Unity In Strength.

Knowledge is Power.

Attitude is Everything.

Activate Hope.

lance armstrong painting: sketches & concepts

The following ideas will serve as visual metaphors and symbolism in the painting which will measure at least 6 x 9 feet in size.

The goal will be to harmonize all of these elements into one beautiful cohesive work of art. The use of thick paint, distressing techniques and alchemy will give the background an old world rustic feel. Set on top of that will be the levitating “key words” and “Lance on his bike”, painted on “high tech modernistic cutouts”. These will be elevated 3–4 inches off the background.

BACKGROUND LAYERS

1.Six Old Rusty Bikes.

2.LiveStrong words woven though everything as repeated wallpaper and will be “sculpted into the paintings background and foreground elements” via 3-dimensional relief.

3.Wings ideas to attach to “Lance’s or his Bike” or to the “Key Words”

4.Da Vinci like scientific outlines

FOREGROUND LAYERS

5.Key Words: Unity In Strength. Knowledge is Power. Attitude is Everything. Activate Hope. will be elevated 1–2 inches off the surface.

6.The Racing Image of Lance is the “seventh image of a bike. This “7th bike is symbolic of his “7” Tour de France victories.

monotype original of lance

My first original of Lance Armstrong. It measures 42” x 63”.

Title: Pushing Through the Pain

I put a (reversed) pencil drawing of Lance on my light-table and covered it with glass. Next to that I hinged a 500 gms. (very heavy and thick) piece of cotton rag paper. I applied color washes of acrylic and pigment on top of the glass and used the drawing underneath as a guide.

Then I flipped the paper onto the wet paint to accept the color and rolled it out flat. (the hinge allowed me to keep things registered for the 3 days it took make the piece) This was repeated more than 75 times with various wet into wet washes and hand detailing.

click on the image to see a bigger version.

Comps Feb 02, 2010

First Bike Sketches / Ideas

1.Motion of the Bike.
2.Power that comes from within.
3.Kinetic Energy.
4.Combination of the same racing pose – overlapping images from different racing years – will capture the essence of time, repetition, endurance and history.

ARCHIVE

Let Your Spirit Soar

(paint wings attached to “Lance’s Bike”)

Albert Einstein said, “try not to become a man of success but a man of value.” Robert F. Kennedy said, “you’re happiest while you’re making the greatest contribution”.

The wings attached to “Lance’s Bike” painting symbolize a powerful eagle ready to take flight and the vast and powerful potential that resides within all of us. It represents the possibilities of what happens when you help others. Even in my worst cancer moments I could always find the strength to help others because I knew that would make me strong and my spirit could soar onward.

Let Your Spirit Soar is a painting of an eagle I did as part of my Art of Hope Series. > read more

I now realize that I may have to use five (5) old rusty bikes and add 2 more “silhouetted bikes” at the left and right edges of the painting. For practical reason this will keep the height of the work at around 6-7 feet max.

The wings are also inspired by artist Damien Hirst

(the world's foremost iconoclasts). His painted bike frame fetched $500,000 for the Lance Armstrong Foundation. > read more

Mix-linear Painting Technique

Inspired by one of my favorite artists, Andreas Nagel, the painting will go into the “third dimension”. Elements of Lance’s body will “separate off of the bike frame”, which will also break away from itself in multiple overlapping layers.

Like a flower opening up – his kinetic energy will unfold before your very eyes.

The “power that comes from within” is now visually represented in dramatic fashion.

Key Quotes “Grow” out of Lance

This approach may work better because the words can now read as a generic extension of Lance as they are centrally connected to his action pose.

See more detail +

Serendipity

As I begin to compose the art some “nice accidents” are happening. The quote from Albert Einstein “try not to become a man of success but a man of value.” Robert F. Kennedy said, “you’re happiest while you’re making the greatest contribution”.

... falls right on top of Lance. A very cool accident !

Even though this is very preliminary (i.e. I will use different font types, and letter spacing) stuff like this is magic.