Sports week continues at 8-Rock.com. In this drawing, there’s a little bit of a fun reference for the rugby insider. Barbarian is a popular brand of rugby gear, including the iconic Barbarian brand rugby ball. Because this drawing depicts three players of African descent, I have replaced the word Barbarian with Zande, the name of the central African tribe that is legendary for its prowess on the battlefield. This drawing is a composite of three of the many Black rugby players I was excited to see at the USA Sevens Rugby Tournament at UNLV, summer of 2010.
Sports week at 8-Rock.com continues with the third of what will be five drawings inspired by the 2011 Rugby World Cup. This drawing, like others in this series, features a limited color palette (white, black, and shades of blue). The drawing in the background is a drawing of a rugby game that was originally published around the turn of the last century. As you can see from the earlier drawing in the background, rugby had been–for the most part–a “white man’s game.” Today rugby is played on all continents (except Antarctica), by men and women of all races and ethnicities.
Sports week at 8-Rock.com continues with another tribute to the 2011 rugby world cup. The backdrop is one of the stadiums from the 2007 world cup, held in France.
Sports week at 8-Rock.com continues with this tribute to the 2011 Rugby World Cup, taking place in New Zealand. The Rugby World cup began on September 9 and it will end on October 23. On the left side of the drawing I have listed all the countries that are competing in this years tournament.
It’s day two of sports week at 8-Rock.com! I know you’re must be positively buzzing with excitement, ’cause I know I am! This drawing depicts another composite figure, based on a salesman at Best Buy and the UPS guy who takes his afternoon nap in the library reading room. I combined the hairstyle from the Best Buy employee and the facial structure of the UPS delivery man with a facial features of my own making. I’m imagining that is this subject of this drawing was an actual UFC fighter, he would probably be a middleweight. The backdrop is the legendary octagon of the UFC.
This week is sports week on 8-Rock.com, dedicated to my two favorite spectator sports, rugby and mma (mixed martial arts). Today’s drawing shows a mixed martial arts fighter in the gym. The figure depicted in this drawing is a composite several athletes that I’ve seen on local basketball courts and in UFC footage.
There’s something kind of wonderful about a big guy who loves small, beautiful things. When I was at the Harrison Street Whole Foods last week, ran into the man in this drawing. He was a tall brother in a white tank top that showed off his impressively sculpted upper body. With his full beard and bushy eyebrows, he looked a little like a Black Paul Bunyan. At the moment when I saw him, though, he seemed a lot more interested in picking out a spray of pink mini carnations than in cutting down trees or hauling logs.
This drawing was originally created to be a part of a series of paintings and collages called The Idea of Ancestry, after a poem by Etheridge Knight. The markings and patterns on the skin of the figure in this picture represent ancestral memory of the African home of his ancestors.
