Long story short,
a few years ago I painted a two part mural for Piedmont Athens Regional Hospital. It lives on a big wall in their cafeteria, and my wife, Katie, who has worked there as a health educator, gets to look at it every day. Pretty cool, huh (;
Two weren’t enough! They asked me back to do a few more, and I was more than excited to say yes. This second round of murals was particularly special for two reasons. One, it honors the hospital’s centennial anniversary… 1919-2019, wow! This hospital is such a massive part of Athens history, so it’s an incredible honor to hang my work on their walls, especially at this scale! Second, the new murals are dedicated to Larry Webb, the former Athens Regional CFO, who passed unexpectedly in 2017. You can read more about Larry Webb here, but he sure was a special man to many, including the staff of this wonderful hospital.
Don’t those black frames really do wonders? That was their addition, and I’m so happy with it! What an opportunity. In terms of the scope and composition of these murals, this feels like my biggest project to date. But technically, it’s my second largest, consisting of 14 4x8ft panels. That makes it just 2 panels smaller than the Tate Student Center mural! Wondering the exact size? …you do the math (;
If you follow my work, you would know I can’t help myself from hiding some fun easter eggs in my paintings, so here’s a list of some that I can remember:
Every car in the Arch panel is a red mustang. Why? They were Larry Webb’s favorite!
In the Athfest panel, I painted my little booth, sunflowers and all (:
Also in the Athfest panel, I did my own rendition of the David Hale mural by Rook & Pawn. A mural within a mural!
There’s a little model train set at the bottom of the Athfest panel… Larry Webb famously had a model train set in his basement that he loved very much!
The tennis sign on the sports collage panel feature Drake Bernstein’s (UGA Women’s Tennis Asst. Coach) favorite match: when GA beat FL
The UGA Sports collage is a special dedication to Larry Webb’s passion for UGA Sports. That man was one committed dawg fan!
Not really an easter egg, but I featured Spike front and center on the Stanford one, and he’s my favorite GA mascot (:
Take a look at some process pics of the below!
I’ve gotta say, as proud as I am of this new milestone project, I’m particularly proud of the Athfest and the UGA Sports collages. I love doing a classic paint-it-like-you-see-it scene, but collages are a special challenge. To warp reality and create something new out of things people already love is a difficult feat! And I like the ones I made. So I’m extra excited for them to live at Piedmont Athens Regional, a place that’s very important to my family and families across Athens.
If the Athfest or Arch panels interest you, take a look below!
