Marriott Bonvoy Basketballs
For this project, 160over90 reached out to me to paint 60 basketballs for Marriott Bonvoy, Marriott’s new travel program, for a WBCA coaching event since the Women’s NCAA basketball final four tournament was hosted in Minneapolis this year (2022). I was asked to paint 60 basketballs by hand, including 10 basketballs live painted during the actual event to bring attention to Marriott’s booth at the convention. The idea ended up being very successful, generating a lot of buzz. I got to connect with a lot of awesome people that loved to see my artwork, and live paint for the first time! The convention was hosted in the grand ballroom at the Hilton in downtown Minneapolis.
Hand painting 60 basketballs took me about a week and a half. I had several boxes of blank basketballs shipped to my house, which took up my entire studio. I started out by opening all the boxes and taping over Marriott Bonvoy’s logo, which I was asked to leave blank. Next, I hauled all the balls out to my garage to spray paint, which never ended up drying due to the cold weather conditions in MN at the time. So, I had to start over. I started painting over all the spray paint with acrylic paint using a brush, then used posca markers to draw on all of my designs. I managed to get all 60 done in time for the event, and shipped 10 to New Orleans, where the men’s NCAA basketball tournament was taking place. I was asked to do designs that relate to basketball or travel, and It was not difficult for me to come up with 60+ designs to put on the basketballs. I really enjoyed doing this project and I thought it was a lot of fun.