Welcome to the "CopperCon 24" bodypainting webpage.  This bodypainting was part of CopperCon 24, Arizona's annual literary-oriented science fiction and fantasy convention.  This year's event was held at the Embassy Suites on September 10-12th and my live bodypainting demonstrations took place on Saturday starting at 4:00 pm and 10:00 pm.


The theme of this year's event was "Here There Be Dragons".  I was asked to do two demonstrations this year with one being an all-ages PG rated demonstration and the other being an adult oriented demonstration.  I make an effort at each of these events to try to come up with artwork in keeping with the theme.  Several months prior to this event, I had done a live demonstration of painting a dragon on a lifecasted sculpture and decided that this image might make a good bodypainting on a live model too.  Thus was born the idea for the PG demo.

I was thrilled when model Jill Valdisar agreed to do the project.  I had met Jill several years ago and even did a bodypainting with her at the 2002 Exotic Art Show.  It had been a long time since we had worked together and she was perfect for the project.

The lifecast, which has been named "Moon of Pern", was on display in the CopperCon art gallery and I had to go borrow it for this session.  The lifecast was molded by Gullwing (www.lifecastaz.com) and was painted at LepreCon 30.  In recreating this painting on Jill's back, I couldn't use the same spray paints that I had used on the casting.  I had to use bodypaints, specifically Totally Tattoo paints from Badger Airbrush, for the model's skin.  I was able to match most of the colors except the teal sky which looked close in the dim lights of the room, but was way off in the camera's flash.  The photographer for this project was O'D of www.images-by-od.com and once again he did a fantastic job.

This painting took about an hour and a half to complete.  Jill was covered in front and wore a thong so that we could keep our PG rating.  Guests in the room included Michael R. Mennenga and Evo Terra, the hosts of the wildly successful Dragon Page science fiction talk show on KFYI here in Phoenix.  I am hoping that they will consider using this image as their logo.  Once the painting was complete, the room was closed off for the photoshoot.

If you are interested in ordering a print from this photoshoot or would like additional information on bodypainting, please feel free to contact mark@futureclassx.com and visit my website at www.futureclassx.com .  Please browse through the additional images from the show below.  Thanks for visiting!


For the adult session, Jill suggested that I contact her friend Dale O who I had worked with for the Janet Jackson "costume malfunction" bodypainting.  Jill called her and she was ready, willing, and able to be a part of the event.  It turns out that she is a huge Star Trek fan and was excited to check out the convention.

For Dale's painting, I was still loosely basing the design on the theme of the convention by creating a dragon-esque bodypainting.  It was a bit of a stretch to combine the features of a dragon with beautiful curves of a fitness model, but I went into the session with a rough idea of what I wanted to do and let the ideas flow.  Earlier in the day I conceived the idea to buy some devil's horns, but instead of gluing them to her forehead, I chose to glue them to each side of her jaw.  The other feature of this painting that everyone got a kick out of was that I painted eyes on her eyelids.  Her eyes are actually shut in most of these pictures.

I used Ben-Nye liquid make-ups for the face painting and applied it with a brush.  Dale's body, on the other hand, was airbrushed with Totally Tattoo paints from Badger Airbrush.  Again O'D was the photographer and the photoshoot was completed in an abandoned water feature at the front of the hotel.  The prop that she is holding is a dragon cane that was hand crafted by the artisans at www.BannerKnife.com who are based out of Sun City, Arizona.  The cane was beautifully ornate and the dragons head unscrewed to reveal a short sword inside.

This painting took just under two hours to complete.  We started around 10:00pm and then the photoshoot was getting kicked off around midnight.  By two in the morning, it was a wrap.  Dale stayed inspired throughout the whole process and even Jill stuck around all day and joined in on a few of the last shots.

If you are interested in ordering a print from this photoshoot or would like additional information on bodypainting, please feel free to contact mark@futureclassx.com and visit my website at www.futureclassx.com .  Please browse through the additional images from the show below.  Thanks for visiting!

I had also committed to do a family face painting panel early on Saturday morning and arrived an hour early to set up my supplies.  The artist guest of honor for CopperCon, Todd Lockwood, was just getting ready to start a lecture series on drawing dragons.  Not one to pass up an opportunity for free lessons from one of the masters, I sat in on the class.  It was very inspiring and I was amazed at how much attention to detail Todd gives to the bone and muscular structure of real animals when creating the fictional dragons.

Once Todd's session was over, it was time for all of the kids to start rolling in to get their faces painted.  With paints ready and brushes in hand, I waited.  And waited.  I stood by for the full hour and not a soul showed up.  With several hours to spare until my next demonstration, I headed out to the art gallery to see more of Todd's paintings.  I later had him sign my copy of an article in the Northwest Valley News that featured two of his paintings, one of the images of my bodypainting from last years CopperCon, and the cover of Splinter in the Mind's Eye, a book that I had read as an adolescent by Alan Dean Foster.  Foster was the writer guest of honor for the event and I also had him autograph the article.  Here is what the article had to say:

Here There Be Dragons

Annual science fiction, fantasy convention takes place in West Valley hotel

by Rich Ott
Northwest Valley News, Friday September 10th, 2004

Two years ago Dawn Mullan was looking for a local science fiction convention.

"I didn't want to travel out of state," said the West Valley resident, who was born in Glendale.  "I wanted something small in our community."

She discovered CopperCon 22, an annual Arizona event that was two weeks away.

"I said, 'I'm going to this,'" Mullan recalled.

This weekend will mark Mullan's third strait CopperCon, as the 24th edition takes place on the first two floors of Embasy Suites, Phoenix North, at 2577 W. Greenway Road.

Next year's silver anniversary will also be there, and so will Mullan, only as the convention's chair.

She was so impressed with the convention after her first time, she decided to get involved with running it.

"I found people who loved science fiction as much as I did," Mullan said of her first CopperCon.  "I found a group of individuals who were serving their community."

One of the convention's big attractions is Saturday's 2 p.m. charity auction.  This year all money raised will go to the Thomas J. Pappas homeless school, said Bob LaPierre Jr., chair of CopperCon 24.

"We will also have a donation box where people can drop off lightly worn books that will go to the Thomas J. Pappas library," LaPierre said.

Items that will be auctioned off at this year's charity event include autographed first-edition hardcover books, signed photos of actors, T-shirts, 35 millimeter movie trailers and Star Wars collectibles.

Mullan has been planning CopperCon 25 for a year now and has next year's charity auction in support of Pioneer Living History Village's educational facility.

The biggest attraction that draws people to the convention though, is its guest of honor, LaPierre said.

"That person will generally bring in people from out of state," he said.

Alan Dean Foster is the guest of honor at CopperCon 24.  The prolific author has written more than 95 novels, including the popular Star Wars book, "Splinter of the Mind's Eye."

"I really lucked out," said LaPierre of landing Foster.  "I've been reading his stuff for more than 20 years."

Other main guests at this weekend's show include artist Todd Lockwood, musician Leslie Fish, body painter Mark Greenawalt and authors Michael A. Stockpole, Catherine Wells, Michelle M. Welch and Adam Niswander.

Also on hand will be radio co-hosts Michael R. Mennenga and Evo Terra of the science fiction show, The Dragon Page, which airs at 6 p.m. Sunday on KFYI.

"We are a very educational convention, but we have fun with it," LaPierre said.  "We have lots of various people involved with the Mars programs coming in."

One of them is Dr. David A. Williams of ASU's department of geological sciences.  Williams has recently been working on data collected by the Mars Express orbiter and will share those findings.

Other events of note:

- An art show featuring more than 500 pieces that ends with a 1 p.m. auction Sunday.
- Tonight's science fiction Jeopardy, where the audience is divided into three teams.
- The Masquerade, a costume competition with prizes Saturday night.
- Mark Greenawalt's live demonstration of body painting as he uses his artistic talents on a model.  This standing-room only event begins around 10:30 p.m. Saturday.
- A concert Saturday afternoon by Leslie Fish featuring filk music, science fiction's own folk music.
- Tonight's chill party and Saturday's modern dance party, both go into the morning hours.

The convention also has it's permanent rooms:  hospitality suite with drinks and snacks; gaming room with role playing, collectible cards and live action gaming; video room with science fiction and fantasy shows movies and trailers; anime room showing Japan animation; and a dealer's room featuring 30 tables of merchandise from 20 dealers.

"You can go to the dealer's room and find something you can't find anywhere else," Mullan said.

Last, but not least, the convention features presentations ranging from solo panels with your favorite author to "How to get into the business" and "Do I need a manager?"

Lee Whitside has been attending CopperCon since 1986, five years after the convention premiered.  Whiteside was the CopperCon chair in 1996 and 2003.

"It's a chance to meet authors and a chance to meet up with people you might only see at conventions," he said of the annual event.

Mullan agrees, yet she also sees the event as a way to help her quest on getting published.

"It is that one-on-one personal interaction," she said.  "You can sit down with these authors and get all the information on how to get started.  It helps me to realize my dreams and one day get my work out there."

(click on the images above for larger images)

Captions:

Two paintings by Todd Lockwood, the guest of honor artist at CopperCon 24, running today through Sunday.

In what is becoming an annual event at CopperCon, artist Mark Greenawalt paints artwork on a model Saturday night in front of  a live audience.  Rebecca Swann, left, was last year's model and displays Greenawalt's work.

Inset:

IF YOU GO

WHAT:  CopperCon 24
WHEN:  3 p.m. to midnight today, 10 a.m. to midnight Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday
WHERE:  Embassy Suites, 2577 W. Greenway Road, Phoenix
COST:  $40 for all three days, $30 for Saturday/Sunday, $25 for Saturday, $20 for Sunday
INFO:  602-973-2341 or www.coppercon.org  

Phoenix NewTimes magazine also wrote an article about CopperCon.  The writer, Jonathan Winters interviewed me several weeks before the event.  I had been interviewed for the prior year's convention and the article didn't even mention me, but this year they made it sound like I was the main attraction.  That was O.K. by me.  The picture that they snagged off of my website is of Kayla Rei from our bodypainting session at the Paper Heart earlier in the year.  Here is the article:

Bodies of Work

Watch paint dry at CopperCon 24

by Jonathan Winters
Phoenix Newtimes, September 9th, 2004

9/10-9/12
All eyes will be on the nude female models artist Mark Greenawalt, uh, coats during his live body painting demos at CopperCon 24, the science fiction and fantasy convention taking place this weekend at Embassy Suites, 2577 West Greenway Road. Sticky latex paint will be applied Saturday, September 11 (CopperCon day two), during a partially nude afternoon show and again at an evening show for adults only. "It's not action-packed, but people are constantly entertained," says Greenawalt, whose wide selection of canvases comes mainly from local modeling agencies. "The final product makes it worth it."

Bring your questions and cameras. He and the models are used to it. "People always ask me if I would paint my wife," Greenawalt says. "The models get asked if it excites them -- or if the cold paint tickles."

Admission is $15 to $40. Call 602-375-1777 or see www.coppercon.org . --Jonathan Winters


Pretty in paint: Artist Mark Greenawalt paints nearly (and sometimes clearly) naked women at CopperCon 24. 



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