Hello everyone! We are now at Day 9-10 of our annual Art April series of creativity for the year, as well as Day 6-7 of #the100dayproject! That means we have completed a full week of continuous creativity per day! One piece has already sold, listed below are the remaining artwork that is available for purchase from our first week of Art April:

• Keisha (SOLD)
• Trippy Grandma (Paypal Only)
• Jodeci Music Block
• Lily (Paypal Only)
• Hands Up, Don’t Shoot (Prints Only)
• SC Flood (Prints Only)
• The People Say Guilty (Prints Only)

During these two days two new digital illustrations were created. Listed below are some background information on each piece for you reference. If you would like to purchase these for your home or business to be on display, they are only available via Paypal, so you would need to email us at deluxds@yahoo.com or deluxds@gmail.com with the subject headers either “SC Flood” or “The People Say Guilty” for purchasing information. Prints are only available at this time as these are digital art pieces:

Day 6: SC Flood

This particular art piece was created to depict a very frustrating time period for the state of South Carolina, mainly the Columbia, Charleston, and Myrtle Beach areas of the state. Being a native of South Carolina, we don’t normally have any major weather disasters here. Of course there are your normal occasions of bad thunderstorms that may come through from time to time during the Spring months and produce a tornado here and there, and of course the heat is always a big deal here as well. But when it comes to anything else major, we are normally sparred away from that sort of thing. From my 25 years of living, I believe the last major weather incident that occurred here was Hurricane Hugo in September of 1989. In October of 2015, just two years ago, that all changed. SC Flood was created as a depiction of what happened to our state during one of our biggest flooding disasters in history. After over 11 dams began to break in the Columbia area along with additional rain, the flood of 2015 put South Carolina at a complete standstill with over 50% of our state being underwater, forcing many to pack up and evacuate their homes for higher grounds. During the flood, 15 people from SC were killed even though evacuations were ordered, 9 people drowned and 6 people died from car accidents while fleeing from the rising water. More than 175 people had to be rescued and over 800 people residents of SC had to be placed in temporary housing. Bridges were severely damaged all over the state and some roads were completely washed out leading to interstate closings down in the Low Country of South Carolina. Summerville, SC residents reported seeing caskets from graveyards floating down the road after so much rain fell and saturated the grounds so much that the water itself ended up pushing caskets up out of the ground. Apartments and homes were looted during this time period as well, so many not only lost valuables and memories due to the water, but they also lost things from others going in and taking them while everyone was evacuated from the area. The illustration below gives just a small glimpse at how things looked during that time period. Similar to our Hands Up, Don’t Shoot illustration, multiple images and photographs from this time period were combined to create a complete illustrated image. The bridge shown in the background is one from Columbia, SC that represents the structural damage that occurred during the floods of 2015. The palm trees and regular trees are from a couple of images out of Summerville, SC and Myrtle Beach, SC during this time period. The cars in the flooded waters are from images out of Columbia, SC and Charleston, SC. The stop sign and the people in the boat were randomly selected from various photos reported out of the SC area during this time. The main focal point of the illustration would be the natural disaster worker which was taken out of Columbia, SC. He was placed in the design to show how he was helping the residents who were in the flooded cars, and now are rowing the boat, back to safe grounds. I went back and forth with deciding if I wanted to create the sky in a cloudy and rainy fashion or your typical blue. Clearly, I chose blue but only as a positive piece for the artwork. I decided to make it blue as a representation that bad times don’t last always and there is always sunshine after the storm.

Credits:
South Carolina Flooding

2016. SC Flood  (Digital Illustration). Retrieved from http://instagram.com/deluxds.

Day 7: The People Say Guilty

For day #7, I decided to go back to another old project that was started a couple years ago titled, The People Say Guilty. This piece goes along with Hands Up, Don’t Shoot piece that was about the murder of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. This particular design is about the murder of Sanford, Florida teen Trayvon Martin in February of 2012. This incident is one that I will never forget, I remember everything that was reported during that time period as though it was just yesterday. Following this particular story is where I first found out about the organization, Black Lives Matter, as well. Just like previous designs like this one, I included the many different photographs and images from news sources to create one big portrait of the event. In the background you will find the apartments on the left hand side of the art piece where Martin was killed by the supposedly night watch of the neighborhood Mark Zimmerman on the night of February 26 in 2012. This tragedy made national headlines because Martin was unarmed at the time and posing no threat to anyone around him. He was walking home from the store after purchasing an Arizona canned drink and a pack of skittles candy. Zimmerman followed him through the neighborhood, even after being told by the police to back off of Martin. He then initiated a fight with the 17 year old teen, ultimately shooting and killing Trayvon Martin just minutes from his dad’s apartment in Sanford, Florida. On the left hand side of the design, I have placed an image of Zimmerman looking up at Trayvon in a sneaky way, similar to how he was sneaking around Martin the night of his murder. I wanted his expression to to seem bothered, yet guilty deep down. On the right hand side of the design are protestors, calling for Zimmerman to be prosecuted for a pointless murder.

Credits:
Trayvon Martin Murder Timeline

2014. Hands Up, Don’t Shoot  (Digital Illustration). Retrieved from http://instagram.com/deluxds.

If you are interested in your very own custom painting from Delux Designs (DE), LLC, email us at deluxds@yahoo.com or deluxds@gmail.com. All painting commission orders are half off until May 01, 2017! All prices listed are for acrylic paintings only. A 50% upfront, non-refundable deposit is required for all painting commissions. Shipping costs are not included.

Thank you to everyone for your support on our art journey! That completes week one, we will be back soon for our second week of creativity! To follow our progress until July 12, 2017, follow us on instagram [@deluxds]!