Note from editor:In our latest Canadian Original segment on CTV National News, Atlantic Bureau Chief Todd Battis turns the easel on Robb Scott, a once struggling artist who’s now rubbing shoulders with some pretty big sports stars.
If you know a 'Canadian Original' we should be featuring, please email us your ideas at originals@bellmedia.ca.
HALIFAX - It's no wonder Robb Scott complains about his posture.
He sits, hunched over an easel for hours at a time. It's here in the basement of his home in the woods outside Truro, Nova Scotia that he brings some of sport's greatest figures to life, capturing their iconic moments in pencil.
There's Sidney Crosby's Stanley Cup moment, hoisting the trophy over his head. A large illustration that won the praise and support of the hockey hero and sold out almost immediately at well over a thousand dollars a piece.
It provided Scott some income and launched what is becoming a promising career in sports art.
The road to success was rocky. He struggled in art , selling sketches on the Halifax waterfront to tourists. And life, turning to drugs, living without direction.
He found his focus when he asked his employer at a car dealership if he could draw a horse he owned. That horse, "Some beach Somewhere" became a record breaker on the harness racing circuit. Scott's drawing was well received. That encouraged him to dream big, to contact Sidney Crosby's people.
"They said we like your work but we can't get Sidney to sit down, he's just much too busy right now," said Scott.
Undeterred, the artist drew the picture over one hundred and fifty hours, sent it to Crosby and within weeks, the star had signed all Eighty-Seven prints.
Looking at the picture of Crosby holding the cup, Scott describes the experience as his own dream moment.
"That was my championship, I should hold it over my head," he laughs.
Suddenly others were taking notice and contacting him.
The next project, for sports card manufacturer, Upper Deck, was an illustration of basketball great Michael Jordan.
He just finished a picture of Hall of Famer, Bobby Orr sweeping past a Czech defenseman in the 1976 Canada Cup series.
The artist and athlete recently met at Orr's Cape Cod Home to sign prints and celebrate the collaboration.
In an effort to share his success, five copies of each work is auctioned on line to raise money for various charities.
Robb Scott's next big play? He doesn't want to tip his hand before the contract is signed, but he concedes, it's one of the most famous athletes in the world.
