Green Bay Packers Jim Taylor running back Sports football art

Green Bay Packers Commission

I have had the privilege to paint art for another NFL football stadium,

Lambeau Field, the stadium for the Green Bay Packers, one of the oldest franchises in the NFL. Eight of my paintings in their permanent art collection adorn different sections of the suites and club levels of Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin I have also have works or art in the permanent collection of the NFL’s Levi Stadium, home of the San Francisco Forty Niners and the US Bank stadium, home of the Minnesota Vikings, among other arena’s and ballparks. 

(see bio.)

About the Green Bay Packers Art

I feel it is a great honor to be able to create work that celebrates the culture and history of Lambeau Field, one of the great stadiums to watch a football game in.  Using canvas, acrylic and other materials such as maps and old newsprint with the images I painted specific players along with a series of old football posters.   I was given great freedom to paint what I wanted.  As my favorite era of the Green Bay Packers was the sixties I created half of the paintings from that period. 

Why I am a fan of Green Bay Packers 

The reason I am such a fan of the Packers is that during the sixties I had a good friend whose family was from Green Bay, Wisconsin We spent a couple of weeks in Green Bay, and went to their practice field every day.  What was so great about those days was that one could sit on the practice field, on the bench, with the players and actually talk with them.  Can you imagine sitting next to your football idols?  My favorite of all times was Ray Nitschke the absolutely best linebacker off all time. Yup. Sat next to him and talked.  Fuzzy Thurston, the great lineman, Jim Taylor, Paul W. Horning, (the golden boy) Jerry Kramer, etc. 

Original paintings are featured in several areas on Lambeau Field's Associated Bank Club Level. It includes rarely seen historical photographs provided by the Press-Gazette and art obtained from nineteen artists through the sports consulting firm, Sports & The Arts.

The sports art by sports artist John Robertson is of JimTaylor, running back is six feet by eight feet, acrylic on canvas.

Green Bay Packers Painting For Lambeau Field Art Collection

About the Green Bay Packers Art Colletion

The painting of a Green Bay Packers football play, in this case a sweep against the Rams,  was created by sports artist John Robertson for the remodel of the suites area of Lambeau Field, the football stadium for the Green Bay Packers.

The new remodel of the suites and club level using art was installed in July 2017.   The painting is approximately 5 feet by 8 feet, acrylic on stretched canvas.  The rest of Jopn Robertson’s sports  artwork (eight pieces) is displayed on the suite and club levels of Lambeau Field, which means it is not available to other fans on a regular basis.

It was a very special night with my wife a few months ago at the Green Bay Packers Art Collection opening at Lambeau Field.  Great celebration and opportunity to tour the stadium and see the eight pieces installed. The enthusiasm and warmth of all the Packer fans involved, from everyone working the event to president of the organization, Mark Murphy, was extraordinary!

For those of you who have not visited Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin, I highly recommend a visit.  First of all, Green Bay is an enthusiastic town for football.  Everywhere there are references to the Packers: restaurants, bars, clubs, businesses all interested in the great game of Packers football.  The stadium itself is just beautiful with a retro look that gives it the feel of old time football.  It has been around for 61 years and yet they maintain it with great care making it a truly fabulous place to watch a game.  In 1999 Sports Illustrated named it as one of the top 10 places to watch a sporting event.  And I can’t imagine it not being still considered one of the best places to see a football game.  I did have an opportunity to see a game a number of years ago which is one of my great memories of seeing a sporting event.  They run tours of the stadium which you will see the history in the art displayed throughout the venue. 

Original sports paintings are available from my studio or on commission.

Acme Packers Sports Painting Green Bay Packers Art

About the Acme Packers Art

 The painting of an Acme Packer (later to become the Green Bay Packers) was created by sports artist John Robertson for the remodel of the suites area of Lambeau Field, the football stadium for the Green Bay Packers.  The new remodel of the suites and club level using art was installed in Green Bay.  The rest of my artwork (eight pieces) is displayed on the suite and club levels of Lambeau Field, which means it is not available to other fans on a regular basis.
July, 2017.   The painting is approximately 4 feet by 7 feet, acrylic on stretched canvas.  Although the Acme Packers never played a game in the snow it seemed appropriate to the player in the snow because of the well known winters of

 About the Acme Packer football team

 The Acme Packers was one of the Packers name before they became the Green Bay Packers.  In 1919 and 1920 there was a packing company where Curly Lambeau was working named Indian Packing. Curly was a player and coach and first coach of the, soon to become, Green Bay Packers professional football team.   The Indian Packing company was bought out by a Chicago packing company called Acme Packing and the two companies became one.  The Indian Packers had the football team and Acme changed the name to the Acme Packers.  As the team was not actually owned by Acme Packing but by a couple of the executives of the packing company.  Through a variety of financial changes the team was eventually (in a couple of years) named the Green Bay Packers and became part of the NFL.  Curly Lambeau was the head coach of the Packers from 1920 to 1949.

Original sports paintings are available from my studio or on commission.

Dan Marino Miami Dolphins Painting Art

Dan Marino Miami Dolphins

Although Dan Marino was one of the greatest quarterbacks in the NFL he never one a championship.  (But in 1984 he did lead the Miami Dolphins to the Super Bowl, where the club lost to the San Francisco 49ers led Joe Montana win of  38-16).  For example Marino was first rookie to start at quarterback in

the Pro Bowl. That rookie year Marino threw for 20 touchdowns, led the Dolphins to a 12-4 record, and became the NFL's Rookie of the Year.  That's not a bad start for a quarterback who had five other quarterbacks in that year's draft taken before he was drafted.

 

At the time one of the greatest years any quarterback has had in the NFL was by Dan Marino.  In that 1984 Super Bowl season he threw for 5,084 yards and 48 touchdowns, both single season records at the time, while also setting new NFL marks for completions with 362.  A quote from Dan Marino and his career says it best, " I just try to be myself, whatever that is. I don't think about how I'll be remembered. I just want to be consistent over a long period of time. That's what the great players do."

It is always interesting to hear what a quarterback has to say about his coach and how he may feel, as a quarterback, about his leadership role.  Marino said this about one of his games.  "We're not running the ball again until we get ahead. Shula was calling the plays, but I told them, 'I don't care what he calls. We're throwing every pass from now until we get the lead.' To Shula's credit, he always gave

me that option. "

Tim Ruddy Number 61 Miami Dolphins Offensive Center

Also in the painting is Tim Ruddy a six foot three inch center who was drafted in 1994.  When listing the all time top one hundred players for the Miami Dolphins Tim Ruddy comes out around number thirty -two.  He spent 10 seasons with the Miami Dolphins and started 140 games.

Howie Long Defensive End Oakland Raiders

The other image in the painting is of Hall of Fame defensive end Howie Long who played in the Super Bowl XVIII with the Los Angeles Raiders in 1984. He was an 8-time Pro Bowler and one-time Defensive Player of the Year in his career.  He recorded 91.5 career sacks and became an NFL sportscaster after retirement.

Sports Art Painting by Sports Artists John Robertson

The painting is three feet by six feet, acrylic on unstretched canvas. 

Vintage Football Quarterback Art Painting

Vintage Football Story

 I don't know much about this vintage football player that I painted from the past.  I ran across the image and thought it would be fun to paint.  I did some search on Google put could find out anything about him - so I thought I might make up a bit of his history.

About Alberte Mortensen - Quarterback

Alberte Mortensen was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1894 to immigrants from Denmark.  The family moved to New Jersey shortly after he was born.  As a baby he had medical complications with his digestive track which led to difficulties in eating anything that was not white.  He only ate white bread, white noodles, white rice, drank milk and, of course liked ice cream (vanilla).  Because he was unhealthy and the family lived in poverty the Mortenen's asked for help from their Norse church which worshiped the old Norse gods of the Viking age - Thor, Odin and Frigg.  The Norse oracle, Völva or “priestess” recommended that they give up Alberte for foster care

Foster Care

The Mortensen family gave up the four-year-old Alberte to an Irish Catholic family, the Hughes.  The Hughes had immigrated to the United States from Ireland during the potato famine.  Once in his new home he adapted quite nicely to a diet of white potatoes.  His favorite dish was colcannon which became a staple at most of his meals.  It is a mash of potatoes, cabbage or kale and butter or cream, flavored with scallions.

Plays Football

Alberte grew heartily on the diet, eventually played on his high school football team, and because of his athletic ability was recruited to play with the a local football "club".  Even though he was only sixteen his skills as a quarterback made him locally famous.  He played for a  "pay for play" football

team which generated a small income for the Hughes family.  Because of his success his biological parents, the Mortensens wanted him back.

The Hughes gave a negative response.  As there is no actual word for "no" in Irish Gaelic, they actually said, "Ní hea," which literally means, "It is not."  The Hughes won in a short court battle and Alberte went on to play college football.  He disguised himself as an Indian  and went to Carlisle Indian Industrial School where he played with Jim Thorpe, the great all-american.

Alberte, was now known as, Abukcheech, which means mouse.  Hid first season as quarterback at the Indian school he dedicated to his foster Irish mother, Chloe  Hughes.  When Alberte turned twenty-one he requested Irish citizenship to play soccer in Ireland.  At twenty-two he left for Ireland   Upon boarding the boat back to his adopted homeland he said, "I am Irish, I feel Irish, I will play forever in Ireland."

THE END 

Sports Artists John Robertson Vintage Football painting is 4 feet by 7 1/2 feet, acrylic on unstretched canvas.

Football Charcoal Drawing of #12 Quarterback.

Here is preliminary charcoal drawing for a large-scale painting of a quarterback being brought down by "his shoestrings." Some linemen and linebackers got to know quarterbacks intimately. I am not sure who wears number 12 as a quarterback now. I know that the Dallas Cowboys, Roger Staubach wore the number. As an aside; here is an odd quote from Roger Staubach: "I have a lot to learn about NASCAR. But I've learned if you have the right people in the right places doing the right things, you can be successful at whatever you do."
　
Art. Charcoal drawing of a quarterback being "sacked’ by artist John Robertson is 18" x 24" on paper.

Football charcoal drawing of Running Back # 34

There has been a lot of good running back wearing the number 34 on their backs. The ones that come to mind are: Walter Payton, Earl Campbell wore it a short bit of time, Joe Perry (old timer), Ricky Williams, Thurman Thomas and of course the great Nolan Ryan (oops wrong sport)

Preliminary drawing for large football painting

Charcoal drawing of a running back wearing number 34.

Football Art by artist John Robertson is 12" x 18" on paper.

Fair Play? United States Ties Slovenia in World Cup Play

Soccer Player Flicking Football
Sports Painting by artist John Robertson
60" x 40" (5 feet by 3 ½ feet)
acrylic on unstretched canvas

American sub Maurice Edu flicks the soccer ball hard for the winning United States goal over Slovenia in world cup play. Wrong. Thanks to the incompetence of the referee from Mali. (Make that from Mars.) (You want to know about the country Mali? Check out this link to the CIA’s

information page about Mali.)

"What was the foul, Coulibaly?" Mute during the game he has not, nor does he have to answer the question according to a foolish rule of FIFA You want to know what Edu thinks? Ask Maurice on his twitter.