Painted Ladies
Local artist De Andre Drake paints on canvases of skin
By Ericka Thornton
The designs Drake typically gets requests for are butterflies, zebra faces, jerseys, cartoon characters, flowers and graffiti. He has painted over 100 girls and is currently looking for more models to complete a calendar for 2009.
You wouldn’t expect someone who to taught himself to draw while carrying out an eight year sentence in a federal penitentiary would eventually get requests from celebrities such as 50 Cent, Mary J. Blige, Ludacris, and Jay Z for his art, but De Andre Drake did exactly that. Now under the banner of “Immortal Images,” something he started in prison, Drake is selling hand-drawn portraits at local art shows. Drake can reproduce stunningly realistic portraits of people from photos.
He also airbrushes portraits and posters of people and celebrities in his shop on Fruitvale Avenue in Oakland called The AVE, which he opened in 2004. Drake, also known as “the airbrush DON,” not only does air brushing portraits on posters and T-shirts, but people as well. The first time he airbrushed a person was when a personal friend of his, who plays in the NFL, asked him to attend a fundraiser and body paint the female entertainers. He accepted the job without any prior body painting experience. Drake’s body art was the highlight of the party. The next day he put the photos of the party on his website and business began picking up.
“I feel like a little kid body painting. Every project is like the first time. It surprises me when I see the finished project no matter how many times I have done it.”
Sittings take approximately 1 ½ to 2 hours and prices start at $150, depending on the difficulty of the painting. Body paint designs usually last about 4 hours.
Artwork by Drake has been requested by a long list of R&B and hip-hop artists: 50 cent, Russell Simmons, Mary J. Blige, the Game, Nas, Ashanti, Wyclef Jean, Ice Cube, Keyshia Cole, Ne-Yo, Jay Z, Ludacris, Andre 3000, Pimp C, Chris Brown, and more. In 2003, Richie Rich purchased a photo for Afeni Shakur in rememberance of her son Tupac.
Rap artist Tiger featured Drake’s artwork on BET’s RapCity in 2001 and 2002, gaining Drake a lot of recognition among the artists in the genre. He also received exposure from MTV and KRON 4 in San Francisco, and has been showcased in Black Beat, VIBE, Showcase, and Hoodstar magazines.
Drake’s portraits have also been exhibited in Sony Metreon in San Francisco, Captured Images Art Gallery, Expressions Art Gallery, Shades of Sienna, and the Black Box.
To hire De Andre for clubs, parties, events, portraits or body painting, please call: (510) 261-4858. Visit his website at www.airballin.com to view photos of his most recent art show, “Art in Motion.”
MySpace.com/airballinattheave
www.airballin.com
MySpace.com/immortal_images
