I’ve been painting almost as long as I’ve been drawing. My favorite things I’ve painted are these skateboards. The process of planning and making them is some of the most rewarding artistic work I’ve done.
Life in Technicolor
This board is a recreation of Liberty Leading the People by Eugène Delacroix featuring lyrics from Coldplay’s Life in Technicolor ii. Fans (and even non-fans) know the painting as the cover art for Viva La Vida. I’m lucky enough to have seen it in The Louvre in all its glory. Both artists’ work inspires me endlessly.
Liberty Leading the People is based on the July Revolution of 1830. The revolt against King Charles X lasted three days.
This personified version of freedom waves around the flag of the French republic.
click to listen to Life in Technicolor ii
Can’t Complain!
This board is a recreation of The Death of Sardanapalus, also by Eugène Delacroix, featuring a lyric from The World at Large by Modest Mouse. It’s a painting where the king orders all his possessions destroyed and people killed. It captures the magnitude of disaster and chaos (original is much bigger). When referencing the painting, I thought of how we've lived through so many large scale disasters and traumatic events these past few years and have been forced to trod on even though the world seems to be falling apart. The combo of the painting and lyric is meant to be an ironic nod to this.
click to listen to The World at Large
The Fools Who Dream
I edited the reference for this board to be a merging of colors and iconic shots from La La Land. The song that Mia sings in the movie for her big audition is one of living life fully and embracing the lows as much as the highs. Fittingly, there is also a line about color, which is the one that inspired me to paint the board.
The color blue in La La Land represents creativity and new beginnings.
If you haven’t seen La La Land, please get on that immediately.
click to listen to Audition (The Fools Who Dream)