Art of the Game is honored to be participating with the Lakers in paying tribute to Kobe Bryant in recognizing the tremendous contribution that Kobe made to the city of Los Angeles and the joy and everlasting memories that he gave to our city and its fans.
To mark this momentous occasion, Art of the Game has made available these two art pieces which commemorate Kobe’s dominant play over our arch rivals the Boston Celtics.
Some might call Lucas Giolito’s shutout of the Astros on May 23 his masterpiece.
And now it is literally a work of art, thanks to his mom, Lindsay Frost, a former actor who has become famous in baseball circles for her oil paintings.
Lindsay Frost, mother of White Sox pitcher Lucas Giolito, was commissioned by the team to paint five works of art depicting representations of Sox history. (Darren Georgia / HANDOUT)
James McCann, who caught Giolito that night in Houston, asked Frost to immortalize that moment as a keepsake.
But the original is going to Giolito.
“As it was progressing, he decided he wanted for his man cave,” Frost said. “So I’m doing another one for McCann.”
“I got a little selfish,” Giolito said. “When you look at the composition of the painting, James’ back is turned and you can’t even see his face at all, and it’s mostly, like, me. So I thought it would be better suited for me to keep that.”
McCann said he’s looking through other game pictures for Frost to capture on canvas but wants to find one of himself with Giolito in it too, “just because his mom’s doing it, and the relationship that we’ve built this year.”
He saw an early version of the first painting. “It was pretty impressive,” McCann said.
He’s not alone. About two months ago, the Sox commissioned Frost to depict five moments and figures from team history on canvas, which they revealed this week and plan to auction for charity at the end of season. The works include interpretations of the Sox’s three World Series championships, a 1917 cap and a vintage bobblehead from 1962.
“I usually do quite bit of research before I go into these things,” she said. “We just tried to give a broad idea of iconic images that spoke to the White Sox and their history.”
Frost has done works for other teams, as well as art galleries, a second career she built from scratch.
‘I gave myself the permission to do it’.
Frost is the daughter of actor Warren Frost and sister of “Twin Peaks” co-creator Mark Frost.
Over 26 years, she has starred in the soap “As the World Turns,” had recurring roles in “Mancuso, FBI” and “Crossing Jordan,” and played Elizabeth Smart’s mother, Lois, in “The Elizabeth Smart Story.” She also had parts in “The Ring” and “Collateral Damage”
“Had a nice long run, but I felt at some point I was dissatisfied, I was frustrated, I was getting a little bored,” she said. “It’s a difficult life when you have children (sons Lucas and Casey) because you’re constantly on the road or you’re gone for long periods of time.”
But she always had two interests: art and baseball. Frost had considered art school before going to drama school, and she comes from a family of baseball fans.
“That was instilled in by her father, my grandfather,” Giolito said. “He was a big Red Sox fan growing up. She grew a big baseball fan, my dad grew up a baseball fan, they got married, I became a baseball player, so she immediately got attracted to sports painting, specifically baseball. It went from there.”
During her transition from actor to artist, she also was raising a baseball player.
“I was at the field constantly, I mean that was my life: in the bleachers, on the field, driving to a field, going to a game, I would sit in the car and sketch when Lucas was at practice or his little brother was at practice, so it just sort of took over,” Frost said.
She coins her style as “expressalism,” which she defines as “expressionistic realism.”
“The passion, it ignited something in me that I had lost in my other profession.”
She took classes and entered works in local art fairs and people started requesting commissions.
“When Lucas was drafted (in 2012 by the Nationals), I had done a painting for my husband of the Nationals hat, and everyone loved it,” she said. “And then people would start asking me, ‘Well, can I have the Red Sox hat or could I have a Yankees hat?’
“I said (to myself), ‘Man, you should do all 30.’ I just did, I just kind of set out a goal to do all 30.”
During that period, Frost made up her mind to try to become a professional artist, and set a deadline of five years to reach that goal.
“It came at time I was watching my sons grow up and finding themselves and following their passions”: Lucas with baseball and Casey with acting.
“It inspired me. It helped me to decide that, yes, this my path now and I’m going to go down it. They’re doing it and I can do it too. They have been tremendously supportive.”
Frost’s big break
Frost painted the caps of all 30 teams and sent six of the paintings to an art show in Hoboken, N.J.
It took a few years, but buzz about the hats drew the attention of Daniel Crosby, the president of The Art of the Game gallery, which is featured in the Dodgers’ and Angels’ ballparks, and the Staples Center.
“He loved the whole concept,” she said. “They took me on.”
The 30-hats collection, displayed at Dodger Stadium, became her signature piece.
“That’s kind of put her on the map,” Giolito said.
Frost added: “The day that they debuted (in August 2015, if memory serves) was day the Nationals were in Dodger Stadium. … I think (Lucas) might have been in A ball at that point. That was a very exciting night for me to see my dreams realized.”
She did more work — baseball caps, bobbleheads, players, memorabilia — for L.A.’s baseball teams as well as the Lakers and Kings.
“That was all on her own,” Giolito said.
Different fields, but the same mentality
Frost and Giolito agree, while they have an appreciation for each other’s work, Frost couldn’t fathom playing sports and Giolito acknowledges he doesn’t have an artistic bone in his body.
“When I was in Chicago for Mother’s Day weekend (earlier this season), they did a wonderful pregame ceremony with the mothers throwing out the first pitch,” Frost said. “I was out there on field with him. … We’re standing on mound, and I’m looking around at that stadium. For first time I get the sense of, wow, you are on stage. ‘This is your stage,’ I said to him. ‘I couldn’t imagine standing up here and doing what you do.’ ”
As for Giolito, actor’s looks don’t make for actor’s chops.
Frost recalled: ”Sometimes in spring training, they’ll do skits. He had kind of a bad experience doing one a couple years ago, forgetting all his lines and panicking and sweating. But he’s very good at just being himself. He’s very comfortable being on camera.”
“It’s true” about the acting, said Giolito, who used to help his mom by reading lines. “It’s something about memorizing lines and having to emote and doing it right.
“What I do for a living, it’s on paper. I look at this (stats sheet) and it’s like I had a good game yesterday. I gave up two runs in six innings and struck out 13. With acting, yeah, you can be good, but that’s some people’s opinion, and other people might not think that you’re good.”
Still, he admires how she maintained an acting career while supporting his baseball pursuits and Casey’s acting aspirations — he’s set to graduate from the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama next year.
“What’s cool about my mom is she’s never satisfied,” Lucas Giolito said. “I think I got that from her: Never being satisfied with what you have and what you’ve accomplished. You always want to keep getting better and keep improving, earn higher and higher achievements.
“She wants to keep painting, just like for me, I’m never satisfied on the field.”
The Houston Astros went from losing 111 games in 2013 to becoming World Series champions last year, capturing the first title in the franchise’s history.
The moment the Astros defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers in Game 7 of the World Series has been captured by Major League Baseball-sanctioned artist Opie Otterstad in a painting that is part of a collection of pieces commemorating the championship.
The painting depicts the moment the Astros stormed the field at Dodger Stadium to celebrate beating the Dodgers 5-1 in Game 7. A limited-edition print of the painting will be given to members of the Astros.
The public can preview the piece as part of the Astros World Series art collection from 2 -5 p.m. CT on March 31 at Off the Wall Gallery in Houston. The exhibition will run through April 15.
Otterstad, a Texas native, has been commissioned for many of MLB’s events, including the Chicago Cubs’ 2016 World Series victory.
Stephen Holland, 76, painted 11 pieces commemorating the Ravens’ first playoff run to Super Bowl XXXV, and he was commissioned again for Super Bowl XLVII. Learn about him and see his paintings.
When I saw the Ravens’ new Super Bowl XLVII paintings this week, I was blown away. Who had done such amazing work?
The answer is Stephen Holland, and he has one heck of a story.
Holland, 76, grew up in the Bronx. He was an artist as far back as he can remember (the class artist in first grade), but had no focus.
He always liked painting the human figure, but as a young artist couldn’t afford to hire a nude model. Thus, he turned to sports magazines to find his first muse.
“I liked football, though I wasn’t a big sports fan. But I wound up getting some sports magazines, and I started drawing from the sports magazines just for the figures,” he said. “At the same time, I was a real screw up.”
He was a terrible student at the School of Industrial Art and later Pratt Institute. He had no sense of discipline and, “it was the 60s.”
But there was more to the magazines than just engaging practice pictures. He started reading the articles and learning more about sports, and he was amazed by the stories.
“I was like, ‘Oh my God, look at how hard these guys work. That’s what you have to do to be successful!’” Holland remembers. “I knew then I had to work as hard as I could.”
That’s when Holland finally found his focus as a sports artist. Holland started painting the greatest athletes in sports and eventually got linked up with famed boxer Muhammad Ali. Holland’s paintings of Ali became the artist’s calling card, and many resided in the former boxer’s home.
Now a California resident, he went on to paint for the United States Olympic Committee, Los Angeles Kings, Los Angeles Dodgers, Los Angeles Angels, Colorado Avalanche and more.
“Because I was such a screw-up, I have incredible respect for professionals in any field,” Holland said. “Athletes, they’re just awesome. It’s almost incomprehensible – their size, strength, ability. They’ve just always blown me away.”
In 2003, Holland met Kristin Powers, the Ravens’ art and design consultant, at an art expo in New York. Powers commissioned him for 11 paintings commemorating the team’s first championship run to Super Bowl XXXV. Those masterpieces hung in the hallway leading to the team’s main conference room for more than a decade, and Powers went back to him after the Ravens won Super Bowl XLVII.
“He’s one of the greatest, if not the greatest, professional sports artists around,” Powers said. “He does the best job of capturing the sport of football in his art. The rough, tough, masculine nature of the sport really comes through in his work.”
Now, as part of the team’s Under Armour Performance renovation, the Super Bowl XXXV series has been replaced by the 11 Super Bowl XLVII paintings, which took him nearly three years to complete. The Super Bowl XXXV paintings are being relocated throughout the existing building.
Of the 11 new paintings, there’s Jacoby Jones’ “Mile High Miracle” and Super Bowl kickoff return for a touchdown. There are two Anquan Boldin touchdown catches and one Torrey Smith touchdown grab over Broncos cornerback Champ Bailey. Ray Lewis is the focus of two paintings. One of Holland’s favorites is of Joe Flacco standing in the pocket with pressure all around him during Super Bowl XLVII.
“I’m really happy with them,” Holland said. “Some of them are almost lyrical in their shapes and forms.
“I tried to put a lot of rich coloring into them. The whole thing is kind of juicy like a birthday cake. I wanted that feeling while still keeping it gritty as hell.”
A gritty birthday cake. Yeah, I’d say that captures the Ravens’ Super Bowl XLVII run pretty well.
When legendary Lakers star Kobe Bryant retired after the 2015-2016 season, sports fans were sent scurrying to find authentic memorabilia of the “Black Mamba” legend.
With so many of the same choices — jerseys, t-shirts, hats and other accessories — wouldn’t it be great if you could truly capture the unique spirit of Kobe in epic style?
…. now you can.
Art of the Game is proud to present the 24 COLLECTION to commemorate the brilliant career of one of the biggest stars in sports history. The Lakers have created the most exclusive piece of memorabilia ever: two styles of a limited edition “Kobe” hat. They are so rare, in fact, that only 8 of each are in existence IN THE WORLD.
Whether you love the diamond-studded Purple Cashmere hat that celebrates Kobe’s 5 victorious wins or the gold-studded Black Leather that is emblazoned with the legend’s number 24, these limited edition hats represent the prestige and determination of a true champion.
Pay tribute to the star-studded Lakers legend with this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to own a piece of NBA history.
Order your Purple Cashmere or Black Leather Limited-Edition hat today before they are all … Mamba Out!
For a private showing, please make an appointment, contact:
Chris – 323.376.4567
Email – [email protected]
In baseball, when the greats retire and take their last pass through the parks, typically they are honored on the field by the teams they played. Often to express their reverence and appreciation a symbolic gift is given. A surf board from a coastal team, a framed piece of their history like a broken bat, or sometimes a loving jab in the ribs like a rocking chair. In the case of Boston Red Sox’ David Ortiz last visit to Anaheim, the Angels arranged with sports artist great Stephen Holland to have an original painting of the “Big Papi” himself that would be presented on the field by their own all-stars Albert Pujols and Mike Trout.
Receiving a Stephen Holland painting as a retirement gift is without a doubt a very special gesture. But it is not an unusual one. This too, in recent years has taken shape as it’s own tradition in baseball (and other sports as well). Over the past few years Holland paintings have been commissioned and presented on the field to a number of retiring players, including Jim Thome and Mariano Rivera.
“I’m humbled by the honor of being asked to create a painting that singularly captures an entire team’s deeply felt admiration for one of the very best players of their time” – Stephen Holland.
“There are no gift registries on these player tours. You can’t go to Macy’s and say, ‘What am I going to give to Derek Jeter?’ ” – Minnesota Twins President Dave St. Peter.
David Ortiz Stephen Holland PaintingDavid Ortiz Stephen Holland Painting
