By some magical moment of the stars aligning I was chosen to be the artist of this year’s Jazz & Heritage Festival poster.

I couldn’t believe it either.

I got the call last summer and had to keep quiet about it until the poster was announced this January.
People ask me if I got to choose what to paint. The answer is no, not at all. Art4now—the company that produces the poster —had a very specific vision. They wanted me to create a sign that never existed.
This year marks the 60th anniversary of the song Chapel of Love so we would be featuring the Dixie Cups.
I was thrilled.
And a little bit nervous.

There were hours and hours of discussion about the composition, the details to include, the colors, and the words. And the amount of sketches and mock-ups used an entire roll of tissue paper.

I based the shape of the sign on actual signs I have seen and photographed—fitting the three portraits into the shape and the colors were inspired from the Royal Pharmacy sign in the Quarter.
To create the ironwork and building I went to the Quarter in the early mornings and photographed multiple samples to use as reference. There’s nowhere that all of this exists except on my canvas.

Painting the portraits was an added challenge. There are often people in signs I paint so this helped guide my plan. I had to think like a sign maker. I had to paint them as if someone had actually painted the sign. There wouldn’t be any detailed shading or sculpting as in a normal portrait. I needed to render these as a flat surface.

And when it came time to add the neon to the sign I wanted to keep it authentic, but not interfere with the faces of the Dixie Cups. Many actual neon signs that include people have detailed twists and turns over the faces that light up at night. But for this portrait, I only outlined their group image. I didn’t want anything obstructing their beautiful faces.

In the end, I feel very proud to have been given this opportunity, proud of the final product—and thrilled that I got to paint these women.

Here’s what things looked like in progress—

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2024 JAZZ FEST POSTER