8 - The Michigan Daily - Monday, July 23, 2001
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Some might think being an artist is a life-long journey fair goers from around the country inspected his art and that's my dream."
- artists are people who always loved to draw, paint, or drew their breaths in. "I like the wow. It's like clapping.
create. But although artists Dave Badger, Laura It's performance. It's just knowing that I can have this 4 &a/ettenam z '
Coppedge and John Hass don't have much in common, effect on people."
besides being exhibitors at the 31st Annual Ann Arbor Art
Fairs last week, none of them expected that art would one
day be their career.
When he was a kid,
Dave Badger never
thought he'd grow up to
be an artist. In fact,
'e Badger Badger said he never
even picked up a pencil F;'
until his second year of
college. Even then,
becoming an artist did- u
n't seem like a choice
he hadmiade.
"I had to admit I ; ..'t
was an artist after
while," said the Indi-
anapolis resident, who
has been selling his A drawing by Dave Badger. "That'sr
artwork at art shows for summer home," he said. "If you like
the last ten years. you should see my winter home."
Badger said he started drawing during the Vietnam
War, when his father encouraged him to go to college
instead of entering the military.
He went to the University of California-Los Angeles, but
didn't know what he wanted to do with his life. Under the
direction of the school he went into architecture, a field he
excelled at but was never quite the best in.
Coppedge When a friend from the university, who continuously
won the school's architecture design contests, asked him
to be his business partner, Badger agreed. The business
took off, giving Badger the step up that he needed to go
out on his own and become a professional artist.
Badger's drawings, whimsical castles based off of
organic details from seashells and rock formations and
comedic illustrations, all stem from his architectural
background, which trained him to catch fine details.
But Badger's real passion stems from trees.
"It's a very natural thing. Most artists use trees as a
backdrop, but it's never used as a subject itself," he said,
adding that trees often have too much detail for most
artists to capture.
One of Badger's first drawings was of the Serengetti in
Kenya, one of the most photographed trees in the world.
It was recently struck down by lightning, a fact Badger
said with regret.
In the end, it is not his passion for trees that drives Bad-
ger to art shows across the country.
John Hass "I get a charge out of wowing people," he said, as art
/4 !A' to4 65e $p
It's not the "wow" that provoked Laura Coppedge, a
resident of Jacksonville, Fla., to become a professional
photograpshic artist.
Coppedge, whose background is in interior and
graphic design, changed her profession after she
found it was easier to make a living taking pic-
tures than designing living rooms.
"It's a gradual thing because you think that
maybe it's not going to work and all you're going
to get is a huge credit debt" she said.
She started out slowly, working at a dark-
room during the day and printing her own pic-
tures at night for years, until she finally
realized she couldn't keep up the pace and
would have to let something -- her hobby or
her job - go.
"I kinda jumped in just doing shows," Coppedge
said, adding she has never had help with her art. "I
ty tend to work pretty much alone because I'm on the
that road."
Although Coppedge faces some competition
among her peers, she said she doesn't consider her work
any better than the work of other photographers.
"I don't actively think about standing out from anybody
else, I just try to make it so there is a lot of light - and
dark," she said. "I hope my pictures kinda make you think
of a story, and maybe you can finish the story."
Most of her photographs feature people in dramatic
scenes and try to reflect motion and movement, some of
the biggest challenges Coppedge faces while working.
"I really like how movement shows ip in photography,"
she said. "I might shoot a role of film and get nothing
close."
Coppedge said another challenge she faces as an artist
is the possibility of running out of ideas.
"It's hard some days when you wake up sometimes
and think, 'what am I going to take a picture of
today?' and half of the times, you don't even know,"
she said. "Sometimes it's not easy. Sometimes you
get tired of it."
And by Saturday afternoon, Coppedge was tired.
"I'm really ready to go home and see my cats," she
said, adding that being on the road was time off from
work. "When you are on the road, you can't really work in
the darkroom."
But tired as she may be, Coppedge is still excited about
what the next couple years might bring.
"My future aspirations one day are maybe to have a
book published and see how that goes," she said. "I think
Unlike Coppedge, John Hass, a 33-year veter
fairs, is choosing to slow down his artistic car4
In his earlier years, Hass used to travel fromF
New York to participate in 30 art shows a year.
The University alum, who has a degree in p1
now down to only six shows a year. He spends t1
the time in his Eau Claire home with his wife,
and kids, where he is a construction worker and tI
of a small parish.
Bass said that while coming to Ann Arbor in the
reaps some financial rewards, it is also a tradition ft
"I started doing this show 27 years ago when y
just set up on the grass anywhere you like,"
"(Financially) this is notan average art fair."
His artistic endevours started as a hobby wh e
at Bell Labs. Bored and in need of a change, he
job.
"I just started to experiment in some things tl
never done before and it developed into
this, gradually," he said. "We traveled the
country for about 10 years."
He said he hopes to produce feelings from
his artwork, crafted from wood and painted
with soft-colored acrylics, and that he does-
n't take the credit for the final piece.
"I give God all the credit for everything I
can do. I believe everything has a source in
him," Hass said. "He's a creator, and I think
a lot of artists have that same urge in them.
They want to create things."
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