The crowd gathered around the circle of canvases, quieting as the countdown began. “Five!” the host shouted. An older gentleman dressed in a frog onesie sipped his wine. “Four.” One artist propped up his paint jars in a row. “Three.” Another artist, Zeus Alexander, wiped his brow. “Two.” Everyone in the room leaned in.
“One… start painting!” yelled the host.
The Canvas Clash isn’t new to Durham. The high-speed painting competition, a benefit for the Durham Art Guild, began last year. The second time around, on Friday, the event had a bigger space and an equally eclectic crowd.
“The idea is to be a part of the creative process,” said Lindsay Hebert of Weird Productions, which teamed up with the Durham Art Guild for the event. “It’s a much different game than just painting on your own.”
The venue, 21c Museum Hotel, glowed with purple lights as a DJ bumped electro funk music and a taco bar drew crowds in the corner. At the center of it all, six easels with matching canvases stood on a tarp. They were lit from above, creating a spotlight on paintings-in-progress by different artists.
And they were definitely different from one another. Competitor Shayla Thornton studied painting and drawing at East Carolina University. Like many other entrants, she has been creating art since she was a kid. Another, Brianna Gribben, remembered her first piece. “I did a drawing on Microsoft Paint… I was probably 10 years old,” she said with a smile, the sparkles on her shirt reflecting around her space like a disco ball.
For some competitors, art is their career. Jasmine Ochoa-Benitez is an instructor at Paint With a Twist in Cary, an art studio and wine bar. Her partner, Calvin Leung, stood closely to watch her paint. He met her when she was instructing him. “That was the best four hours of my life,” he said laughing.
The night was divided into three rounds featuring 12 competing artists: six artists in round one, the other six in round two. Attendees voted by placing chips under the artists’ paintings while a silent virtual action for each piece happened in the background. The final showdown, the championship round, featured winners from the first two clashes.
Zeus Alexander, dressed in his black apron, was ready. He spoke with a bright voice as he walked through his thinking before the first round.
“I’m really excited… I’m not that experienced though,” he said. “I gotta see if the work I’ve put in has been enough, or if I gotta go back to the drawing table.” He paused, laughing. “No pun intended.”
The timer started. Artists lunged into their places. Some wore headphones and painted with their faces inches from the canvas. One competitor brought his canvas down to the floor and painted barefoot. The crowd began circling the canvasses, stopping at each one.
“I wasn’t nervous until people started moving,” said Thornton afterwards. “I told myself, ‘Don’t turn around.’”
Alexander began by drawing a crude, oddly shaped figure with a crayon-like tool. He ended up with a painted portrait of a person surrounded by colorful accents.
Art-lover Justin Shawl stood behind Alexander, watching the painting come together.
“How he started, [versus] what he ended up with,” Shawl said, shaking his head in disbelief. “It was not what I expected.” He paused for a moment. “It’s amazing… I could barely sign a card in 20 minutes.”
As the second round opened, one canvas station was empty. The crowd looked around as the host announced a surprise competitor. In walked Joel Tesch, the winner of last year’s Clash, clad in a pink bird costume, wearing big pink boots. He proceeded to paint a portrait of Frankenstein’s monster depicting a gaunt face and closed eyes.
Lara Jean-Francois, a newcomer to the Durham Art Guild and Durham, used thick globs of paint to create a textured depiction of koi fish. She first competed as a painter for a beauty pageant in high school. “It was for the talent portion,” she said. “I’m an artist, I can’t sing, I can’t dance… I decided to paint.”
After the first two rounds, the finalists were selected: Ochoa-Benitez, Alexander, Jean-Francois, Tesch and a fifth artist who goes by “Red.” Red’s mom, Shaundell Pannell, sat patiently behind him as the championship round started and Mayor Leonardo Williams arrived, wandering through the crowd and posing for photos. “Art is how we creatively tell our story,” he said. “It’s truly amazing.”
People squeezed around the canvasses for the finale. Alexander began with his usual crude sketch. Red stared intently at a reference photo on his phone. Jean-Francois painted her canvass black and began blotting textured flower petals. The competitors seemed more focused than before — Tesch even took off the pink boots as he began to paint a forest scene.
Brushed swirled in murky water. Pallet knives scraped against canvases. Jean-Francois pulled tools and paints from a cluttered rolling shelf. Red used a solo cup as a palette and used just one coffee-brown hue with varying levels of saturation.
As the crowd counted down the last five seconds of the championship, Jean-Francois stood back, looking nervous. Alexander swung his hands back and forth, pacing as venue volunteers placed his work on the display board at the end of the room. Voting began. The sound of plastic chips clinking in glasses beneath the finalists’ paintings echoed throughout the room. It was finally time to count.
Jean-Francois, the young artist with the textured paintings, took second place. Out of the crowd emerged the first-place winner flashing a stylish fedora.
Alexander, the self-taught painter, threw his hands in the air. “I’m greatly humbled,” he said. “I really love watching what other people do… that’s what made me paint.”
As he packed up his paints, he struck up a conversation with attendees interested in the local art scene. “Come over some time,” he said warmly. “I have to show you around!”
Pictured at top: Zeus Alexander claimed the top prize at this year’s Canvas Clash. Photo by Reece MacKinney — The 9th Street Journal
