I’ve written previously about how painting a portrait of someone you’ve lost has helped me process their passing. Painting this portrait of Kobe was no different. I’ve been a Lakers fan since I was a teenager growing up in NZ. When the news broke I actually cried and it surprised me. I didn’t know Kobe personally so why was this affecting me this way?
Painting him helped me process some of that. I was fortunate that I had a reference photo to work from that I owned the rights to. It’s hard when you paint a celebrity because you usually don’t have access to them and therefore you’re using someone else’s copyrighted image of them. But I had an opportunity to photograph Kobe during the 2009 playoffs on their way to winning the championship that year after a producer friend of mine arranged media access for me.
At the end of practice, when all the media interviews were finished, Kobe was just standing at the edge of the court by the exit to the tunnel so I took a few more while he was looking around then he turned and looked right at me. I remembered feeling intimidated by his stare and nearly putting the camera down. I’m glad I didn’t. This was the photo I used for the painting. I liked how it captured that look that so many of his opponents faced every game throughout his remarkable career in the NBA.
While painting Kobe I thought about why I cried and I realised it was that I’m now a father of two boys and my firstborn, Elias, was born not only that same year, 2009, but literally during their championship winning game which, amazingly, was playing on the TV in Joy’s room at the hospital before the delivery kicked into high gear!
I felt the pain of the loss of Gigi as a parent and what that would mean for Vanessa Bryant and the rest of their family. There’s something about the bond between a parent and a child that can only be experienced to be understood in full.
Anyway, thank you Kobe for all the memories and my condolences to the Bryant family and all the other families involved.
