The Story of the Boxers at The Naenae Boxing Academy, Lower Hutt, New Zealand

Billy Graham, of the  Naenae boxing academy approached me on early 2006, asking about painting portraits  of  heavyweight boxing champions onto large slabs of granite. I worked  from books, digging up photos of the champs. I decided to use charcoals and  graphites, they suited the stones which weren’t at all smooth. I felt that charcoal on stone seemed fitting, probably the first artistic medium. Also, the subject matter ultimately is a base human sport. In practice, the chemistry of painting onto rocks required a combination of shellacs, polyurethanes, acrylics, graphites and charcoals. In  practice, I have yet to put together a complete slide show of the work so watch this space.

Click to view full image of each boxer.