Interview with Maggie Keane & Sam Jennings

Streamed live on Aug 14, 2025  Freakapotamus Podcast

My apologies about my audio portion. Issue corrected going forward. Maggie & Sam’s audio was spot on! Enjoy the interview!

Have you ever wondered who’s behind the best Prince murals in the country or who is the mastermind behind some of the hottest Prince album covers, artwork & websites?

Join me LIVE right here & on YouTube

   / @freakapotamuspodcast 

TONIGHT 8.14.25  8PM EST

Interview with artist & muralist Maggie Keane  & Sam Jennings - artist, designer & former art director for Prince!

#prince #princerogersnelson #lovesymbol #theartist #theartistformerlyknownasprince #TAFKAP #purplerain #underthecherrymoon #graffitibridge #3chainsogold #love4oneanother #peaceandbewild #thepurpleone #paisleypark #npgforlife #minneapolis #minnesota #purpleyoda #purplefam #prnlegacy #purplearmy #therevolution #newpowergeneration #princelegacy #prince4ever #princestagram #princeedits #ripprince #blackartist


#Prince
#PrinceRogersNelson
#PrinceByJeffKatz
#PopArt
#princetagram
#ArtPhotography
#WallArt
#ArtGallery
#PRNLegacy
#Prince4Ever
#ContemporaryArt
#JeffKatzPhotography

Transcript

SPEAKER_06 0:14

What's up, y'all? Freak a potamus coming to you live from the ATL thirty-one sixty-five Main Street. Brownies Cleaners, the famous Prince Mural of Atlanta, on this dreary Saturday afternoon. Could not come to the ATL without stopping by and checking this out for you. Anyway, if you're in the ATL, make sure you stop by at thirty-one sixty five Main Street, Atlanta. On the side of uh Brownies Cleaners. I think this was done last year or the year before. Done by this artist right there. As you can see, folks are stopping by. You're not gonna be alone when you come here, you got fans stopping by checking it out as well. You got the mirrored glasses, Princess Trademark. Got the silhouette of the piano and microphone era. You got the purple rain era, and you got the under the cherry moon era.

SPEAKER_03 2:31

Welcome to the Freak Epartments Podcast. You ready for some RB funk? So in prints? Let's go. Now, your host, the real Russell.

SPEAKER_06 2:57

What's up, everybody, and welcome back once again to the Freak Eponymus Podcast. How's everybody doing today? We are the show where we bring you the voices that shape the sound of yesterday and also the voices that shape the sound of tomorrow. I am your host, the real Russell, and today we've got two treats for all the art and mural lovers out there, especially pertaining to music. Yes, we usually talk about music, but tonight it's about the art. As we all know, music and art go hand in hand. In lieu of my recent trips to see the incredible Prince murals in Atlanta and Minneapolis, I was so inspired by the art, I wanted to dig deeper into the minds and creativity of the artist behind the work. So with that said, today's guest is a true force in public art, transforming blank walls into vivid tributes that stop people in their tracks. Maggie Keene is a Phoenix-based muralist and courtroom sketch artist whose larger than life portraits of legends like Prince. David Bowie and Freddie Mercury have become local landmarks. Her creative path has been anything but typical. Studying fine art, painting billboards, running away just to join the circus. I want to hear about that. Restoring historic uh carousels, sketching high-profile trials. Maggie's work doesn't just beautify spaces, it tells stories, honors icons, and captures moments that matter. Let's welcome the also talented uh Maggie King to the show. Let's see if we can get her in here real quick. There she is.

SPEAKER_02 4:37

Am I here? Yes, can you hear me?

SPEAKER_06 4:42

Yes, ma'am, sure can.

SPEAKER_02 4:44

Oh, that's good.

SPEAKER_06 4:47

Thanks for joining us tonight.

SPEAKER_02 4:49

Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_06 4:51

Yes, ma'am. Can't wait to hear the circus story.

SPEAKER_02 4:53

Oh, yeah, it's a good one.

SPEAKER_06 4:56

All right. Our second guest has shaped how we see music, art, and digital creativity. Sam Jennings is an award-winning art director, designer, and painter whose career spans collaborations with cultural giants like Prince, ProJam, and David Bowie. For nearly a decade, Sam served as Prince's webmaster and art director, launching the groundbreaking NPG Music Club and creating iconic album art for musicology and 3121. Beyond music, his bold, color-rich portraits and digital designs continue to merge fine art with cutting-edge technology. Sam's work proves that creativity has no limits. Whether it's on a canvas, a wall, or a computer screen, or an album cover. Let's give a warm welcome to the incredible Mr. Sam Chinny. Hello. Hi Sam, hurry, sir. Welcome.

SPEAKER_04 5:51

Good.

SPEAKER_06 5:53

Thanks for joining us tonight.

SPEAKER_04 5:55

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_06 5:57

All right. Thank you so much, both of you, for uh being here tonight. Taking some time out of your busy schedules. I've got to say that I'm really impressed with your body of work. Uh I've physically seen your work in person. For Maggie, I just visited the incredible Prince Mural in Atlanta for Sam. I visited Paisley Park in 2021. Yeah. And was blown away by the influence mural that's there. And I know you've done a ton of other things. I know we talked on the side about beating people up with prints, and I'm I promise I wouldn't beat you guys up with prints, but we'll get to all that later. And uh so we'll get into all that later. So if you guys are ready to get into it, we'll go ahead and get into it. All right. All right. All right. I think what we'll do is we'll try to bounce back and forth between the two of you so that we can kind of equally share your journeys to fill the time space. And I think we'll also go ahead and uh we're gonna open up the phone lines tonight for anyone that uh wants to call in, show love, or ask questions. And uh we'll start off uh with the both of you guys. Uh could you kind of walk us through your early life and how you decided to pursue art?

SPEAKER_01 7:10

For me?

SPEAKER_06 7:11

To anybody who wants to go first, that's fine.

unknown 7:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 7:15

Um well I always do that and um used to get in trouble for doing that in school. And when I was really young, I thought everybody did it. So I didn't think there was anything unusual about wanting to draw a lot. Um learned that about that later on that um not everybody likes to do it or can do it. So um I just drew and drew and drew, and once I found paintbrushes, I just painted and painted and painted. Anything I saw, anything I could, you know, like landscapes would intrigue me, animals always didn't get into people until later. They they seemed a little daunting to me, and then um then I started doing people.

unknown 8:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_06 8:04

So this started out as at childhood or when did this come about?

SPEAKER_02 8:08

Yeah, child childhood. I was uh you know, a doodler and and um crayons and paints and everything. I was I was always really interested in those things, and as I got older, I I you know, I just really felt this urge and you know, discovered that I had this urge just to keep keep on drawing. Like a lot of people are they want to do math or they want to do sports, uh, they want to do music. I wanted to do drawing.

SPEAKER_06 8:41

Very nice. What about you, Sam?

SPEAKER_04 8:44

Uh yeah, similar to that. I started drawing when I was a kid and really got into the idea of being an artist and and uh creating. I really wanted to be creative uh in what I was gonna do for my life. So I pursued that to college at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and then um while I was in college, that's when the internet was starting to become a thing. So um I was studying design and painting, but I also started studying web design and using the internet as an art tool. So that led to uh connecting with Prince and then everything that came after that. But yeah, I've always kind of had it in my head I wanted to be a visual artist, and uh Prince was actually a big inspiration because he uh he cared so much about his visual presentation that it really kind of showed me a way that it could all come together in like one big cultural uh connection. So but yeah, that's kind of what led me down the road.

SPEAKER_06 9:40

Okay, awesome. Uh you mentioned some of these things before, but based on my research, you can correct me if I'm wrong on anything, but um, you said you were born in San Francisco raised in Chicago, correct? Correct. Okay, I've studied at the Art Institute of Chicago. It's ironic. I I studied at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh as well. So we have common, yeah. So how do those environments uh influence your early creative development?

SPEAKER_04 10:06

Well, um I think being in a school environment, it kind of exposes you to a lot of different ideas, a lot of different ways of doing things, but it also exposes you to how the world perceives um art and how the world looks at artists themselves. Because you really kind of put into that world and show them what it's like. And uh fine art wasn't really gonna be my thing. I really got into the whole design thing. I I really got into communicating with design and and sharing that way. So that's really what led down using computers and um Photoshop and all these things to really delve into uh these ways to use it as not only an art tool, but as a communication tool.

SPEAKER_06 10:54

So you're both celebrated for your art and your murals of music icons like Prince and David Bowie and some others. What draws you to the to these particular figures and uh how do their personas influence your mural design or your art designs?

SPEAKER_02 11:13

Um well, my family is full of musicians. And um, my dad was a drummer and he played in you know symphonic bands and uh army bands, and that's how he met my mom in the army band. She was uh playing the trombone while he was playing the drums, but she was primarily a piano and organ person. So I never really got the music, Gene. I can hear it and sing it and you know know what's going on um pitch-wise, but as far as playing an instrument, the discipline for um practicing was kind of not there. But I had tons of discipline for drawing and doing things with my hands. So um when I um started to do musicians, I thought, you know, I really I I really appreciate what musicians do. So it's kind of my way of giving back to what they provide me. Um I just I get very inspired to do portraits of them and to create something exciting um that'll show the music. And you so you can like, you know, almost hear what they're doing. Um, I used to uh when I was a teenager, I used to go to my dad's band rehearsals and just sit and draw everybody, you know, and everything that was in the room and everybody and their instruments and their music bands, things like that. And that was good practice for being the court's guest members.

SPEAKER_06 12:48

Yeah, yeah, you mentioned earlier that um seeing a mural, sometimes you can almost hear what they hear what they're doing.

unknown 12:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 12:57

Yeah, when I saw the Prince one in Atlanta, I could actually hear the music from each era that you painted. It was crazy. I was hearing it in my head at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 13:06

Well, he was uh I you know, I was a big fan of Prince, and um I did a couple of portraits, smaller portraits of him back in the 80s. Um but when I started doing mural, I decided uh that's what I'm gonna do. One day I'm gonna do a Prince mural. And I was kind of designing it in my head for years. I'll have this over here and I'll have that over there, and it kind of uh developed organically, and I tried different things for the background, but I planned out the um position of each figure, and then let the background develop organically.

SPEAKER_06 13:43

Okay. I guess that leads me to the next question. Um can you share the creative and technical process behind the the murals in Phoenix and Atlanta? Uh how did it evolve from a concept to the to the pieces that we see today?

SPEAKER_02 14:00

Well, um I was a billboard painter, so that technique of painting billboards just fell right into doing murals. Uh we use a projector and um worked in a big warehouse and projected the the pictures on the on the billboard, sketch them in and then paint them in. And so when I started doing murals, painters became obsolete in the billboard business, and now they're all vinyl wraps or they're digital. So, you know, I just decided I'm gonna do this on walls around town and see how that works out. And so far, so good. It's tricky to the the trickiest part is getting down there and and setting up to project. You never know what you're gonna come across, if it's gonna be um there's gonna be things in your way, if there's gonna be street lights turned on that are gonna interfere with the with the picture. So um it's a very interesting process. But then you you get everything drawn in. Well, for prints particularly, there was a big bright street light um hitting that wall. So when I was across the street, I could see the picture that I was projecting. But when I ran over when I ran over to it, it would disappear. So I would just go over and throw up little hash marks as landmarks and then just kind of freehand it in later.

unknown 15:20

Right.

SPEAKER_06 15:22

Okay, so do you typically work um from back to front? Is that how it's done as far as a mural goes? Like you first and then you work backwards?

SPEAKER_02 15:32

That was one of the things we did when when I painted a billboard, we did we work back to front and dark to light. So uh when I started painting canvases, I did the same thing, and then I discovered it doesn't really make that much of a difference. I like to get the the tricky parts done first, meaning the faces.

unknown 15:57

Right.

SPEAKER_02 15:57

You know, I like to get those done and um work on everything else, and then later on I'll come back and see something wrong with that face. I'm constantly noticing some things that are off, so I would change them as I go along. But yeah, it doesn't really matter what I do, but um, you know, if it's back to front.

SPEAKER_06 16:18

They actually had a picture, I don't know where it is tonight. Maybe I didn't uh upload it, but it was a picture of I think it was the Prince Phoenix mural, like in the in-between phases. It wasn't complete yet.

SPEAKER_02 16:31

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_06 16:32

That was interesting to see. It was just, I think what I saw was just silhouettes.

SPEAKER_02 16:37

Right.

SPEAKER_06 16:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:39

Yeah. I wanted I knew I knew I knew that I was going to be coming those images. So I got them up first. And uh I had a couple of different things going on in the background that I got rid of. And uh then I I asked a friend of mine to make me a stencil. He does uh laser cut things out of wood and all kinds of materials. So he cut me out a state a stencil that's got the little print symbol in it, and that worked out really well for the background, and then of course I was gonna throw in the doves.

SPEAKER_06 17:12

So for the both of you, looking back, uh, what art or mural are you most proud of, and what emotions or messages were you hoping to catch capture?

SPEAKER_04 17:29

Wanna go first? Sure. Um I'd say the thing that I'm most proud of uh visually would be the 3121 album cover. Um that whole period of time was very um creative, and Prince and I were working on a lot of stuff directly. It was really fun time. He was staying out in LA, so I'd come out to LA and visit and work in the studio. Um, so it was really just yeah, that's it. It was really great time, and it's interesting about the covers that the photo was taken just kind of randomly. Um, it was like backstage at an award show, and uh he just wanted to get a picture of his jacket. But then when I saw the picture, I thought, you know, that's a really great album cover because it communicates the album. We know who the silhouette is, it's obviously Prince. We don't need to we don't need to blast that out. Like, let's just make it this simple cover. And then I added some embellishments and um uh the colors and the oranges and other things like that. But um, it's interesting because that album, the artwork for the album changed a lot over the six or seven months that we worked on it, but the cover stayed. There was the one thing that like was constant throughout, and I was really proud of that. And then when it came out and I saw posters of it around the world, I was I was really happy about that. I thought it came out really well.

SPEAKER_06 18:54

Nice, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:55

You mentioned I'm jealous, I'm jealous, and got to work with him. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_04 19:02

Yeah, it was uh you know, he was a great he was a really great person to work with as a visual artist because he he thought about those things, but also he had a very clear vision on kind of the ideas that he wanted to express. Like I always say that if he knew Photoshop as well as I did, I wouldn't have had a job because he he had ideas, he had things he wanted to see, and so for me that was really great to just articulate his vision and um you know work together that way. It was a really good uh working relationship.

SPEAKER_02 19:31

Yeah, besides his music, I mean I really loved his music. How you can't not dance to it, but he but visually he was just incredible, and all the colors and all the textures, I just love it all. You know, it's you know, the lace and all of the shiny things, it's all really uh uh I like a challenge. So I just really got into that.

SPEAKER_06 19:53

Yeah, you can definitely tell he was very visual and cared about the visual as much as the music.

SPEAKER_05 19:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 20:00

And um, it was definitely a perfectionist. Did he kind of give you some leeway as far as the creativity goes, or was he uh kind of in control himself?

SPEAKER_04 20:13

It was a little bit of both. It kind of depended on the project. There'd be times when he'd say, Um, you know, I have an idea for something called Lotus Flower, so put together some ideas based on that. And so I would. And or one time he told me he was working on a jazz album, he said, make the cover look like jazz. And I said, Okay, and that's kind of all he gave me. So I I worked on some ideas, some art that I liked, and showed that to him. But other times he was very directed, he he had a very clear idea of what he wanted, and uh we would we would sit together, he'd sit over my shoulder, we'd go through fonts together, um, we'd pick colors together. Um he was very involved. So I really appreciated that because not all the artists I've worked with have have been that involved in the creative process.

SPEAKER_06 20:59

Yeah, yeah. He knew what he wanted. Yeah. What about you, Maggie? Any uh uh murals that stand out for you?

SPEAKER_02 21:08

Well, the Prince one is my favorite, the the Phoenix Prince one, and then I think the Atlanta Prince one is my second favorite. And then I think the David Bowie one is my third favorite. And the other Prince mural, the one head, I think that's my fourth favorite.

unknown 21:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:26

Yeah, they they um, you know, when I did the David Bowie mural, it was right after he passed away. And this wall is right down the street from my house. And the person living in that house was a friend of ours, you know, our neighbor. He asked me if I'd paint something on the wall to keep it from getting tagged. So I said, sure, but I didn't know what I was gonna do for the longest time. I didn't know what I was gonna do. Um, and then on when he passed away, that there was no other choice of what I was gonna do on that wall. I'm gonna do David's bully. He's another visual. You know, visually interesting guy too.

SPEAKER_06 22:08

Yeah, I was looking forward to the the actual picture. There's some bully right there.

SPEAKER_04 22:16

Oh yeah. I recognize that. So I yeah, this was done on totally on the computer on my WakeComp tablet.

SPEAKER_02 22:26

Yeah, yeah. I'm like, I didn't do that.

SPEAKER_04 22:29

So using a a stylus and Photoshop.

SPEAKER_02 22:32

That's cool. I made that. Yeah, I'm I'm totally old school. Paintbrush in my hand.

SPEAKER_04 22:38

Done a lot of that too.

SPEAKER_02 22:41

Yeah. Yeah, I'm not sure. I prefer it.

SPEAKER_04 22:45

Yeah, the one thing I like about the doing things digital is it's less messy.

SPEAKER_02 22:50

Right.

SPEAKER_04 22:51

You know, the the messy arts, there's the cleanup and the absolutely. Yeah, it's it's a process.

unknown 22:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 22:58

But digital I can just jump in there and knock something out. But yeah, painting's definitely I I wouldn't have been able to do it without the painting background for sure.

SPEAKER_05 23:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 23:09

There's more of uh Maggie's Bowie designs.

SPEAKER_02 23:14

That was done for uh a fundraiser for the local radio show that plays the coolest music in the world. So I I did that for a raffle on other fundraiser.

SPEAKER_04 23:28

Very cool. Very, very cool.

SPEAKER_06 23:38

All right, well, Mr. Sam, uh what first drew you to blending fine art, especially oil and digital painting, uh, with cutting-edge uh digital expression?

SPEAKER_04 23:49

Well, uh, like I said, in when I was in college, it was really starting to become a thing. And so that was a really great environment to be exposed to new technology, new ways of doing things, uh, with classes you could take, and also other people who are in the same boat as you who could help you out and um you can help them. So I still maintain painting, but uh that it felt like it was more for me doing the painting. And the digital art was going to be something more commercial. So um and then I started doing digital portraits just to try it out, and I wound up doing a lot of those, but um, yeah, I was really just kind of as a way to form a career was definitely using the digital arts and digital process, which was just becoming more and more popular at the time.

SPEAKER_06 24:39

Yeah. These are absolutely incredible.

SPEAKER_02 24:47

I painted that Elvis.

SPEAKER_04 24:49

Oh yeah, that's a good photo.

SPEAKER_06 24:52

Yeah, I'm just uh showing some video of your actual body of work, not necessarily what's that? I'm just showing video of your actual body of work, not necessarily uh pretty much a lot of your other stuff as well. Like the website. We'll talk about the website.

SPEAKER_04 25:15

That's the one that was supposed to look like jazz.

SPEAKER_06 25:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 25:27

Yeah, that was when he did his residency there.

SPEAKER_02 25:42

Okay, now you're what I said, well, you're the guy, and I'll have to get permission from you if I use one of your photos, huh?

SPEAKER_04 25:51

Yeah, a lot of the photos were taken by Afsheen Shahidi and Steve Park, so I gotta give credit to them for those really great photos.

SPEAKER_06 26:00

Amazing photographers.

unknown 26:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 26:03

So Maggie, uh reflecting on your journey, and you mentioned you were a billboard artist as well. From a billboard artist to a uh mirrorless, courtroom sketcher and uh restorationist, what advice would you offer uh emerging artists?

SPEAKER_01 26:19

You're you're breaking up. I'm gonna have to repeat that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 26:23

Yeah, I was asking, reflecting on your journey from a billboard artist to a muralist, uh, courtroom sketcher and restorationist, what advice would you offer emerging artists finding their path?

SPEAKER_02 26:35

Not to get discouraged if you're not happy with something you're doing and you you want to stop doing it, don't just keep doing it, just keep going. If you really have, if you feel that urge to do it, you know, just keep doing it. Don't listen to anybody that tells you you need to do this or you need to do that. Follow what's in your gut and in your heart. And if they're if if if their advice is is uh worth taking, it'll occur to you later. And and you'll go, Yeah, now I know what they were talking about. You know, I had some art our teachers try to do do this, and I was just very, you know, stubbornly going, no, I'm doing this. So yeah, I would just say don't don't get discouraged and don't stop.

SPEAKER_06 27:31

What about you, Sam?

SPEAKER_04 27:33

Um, I've always I've always thought um, you know, that sort of old saying about how you gotta put in 10,000 hours into something to become an expert. Like I've always really felt like people just need to do the work. Like just do do a bunch of ugly stuff, do a bunch of stuff that doesn't work, but just like keep doing it, keep creating, keep making things. And that's the only way you're gonna get really skilled at it, is just by doing it. So that's what I always tell people. Just do it, even if no one sees it, even if it's just for you, just make stuff.

SPEAKER_06 28:09

I agree. That's what I was always told. I think most people work. What do you both um hope that viewers uh connect with most when they see your work?

SPEAKER_04 28:23

Where are they connected most?

SPEAKER_06 28:26

Yeah, what do you what do you both you uh what do you hope viewers can connect with most when they see your work?

SPEAKER_04 28:33

Well, I think for me it's uh just some energy, some sense of something dynamics going on, that uh it's just full of life and that people get inspired by it. I you know, I'm inspired all the time by visual artists and musicians and uh hope to connect with that for the audience.

SPEAKER_02 28:52

Same here. You know, especially with a musician, like you said, if you can look at the mural and hear their music, that's that's uh that's that's one success.

SPEAKER_06 29:02

Oh yeah, for sure. So how do you both typically approach your work? Uh whether it be a new mural or art piece from concept to completion. How do you approach it? Typically.

SPEAKER_01 29:18

Go ahead, Sam.

SPEAKER_04 29:21

Um well, there's a lot of there's a lot of sketching out, there's a lot of trying things, there's a lot of uh you know, kind of A B testing, like looking at one version versus another version, see which one works best. Um you know, that kind of process. And then finesse it is also a long process for me, just like getting it to the point where I can let go and say, um, it's it's good enough. Because I think for artists, like it's never done. It's always there's always like you were saying, Maggie, something to change or tweak or adjust. So at some point you just have to let it go and it's done.

SPEAKER_02 29:55

When that when that time rolls around, I feel it. I feel that I'm done. You know, I I just come to that spot where it's like, okay, I'm walking away. But the way I do it is um it takes me a long time to do a bunch of sketches. So what I do is go on the computer and I look for images that I like, images that that um represent the person or the place or the animal or whatever, the best. Um if this face is better than that face, I'll take that head and put it on a different body. And because I like the pose better, or I like those clothes better, and I'm I'll move that arm, I'll get another picture of another arm and put it in there in such a way that it just changes. It's like nobody took that picture. Several people took several pictures, and I busted them up and made another picture out of them. So then I just arrange things on the computer and I move things around to get them to you know occupy the space, you know, creatively and interestingly, and um put a background behind it on the computer. Didn't do that for print because um I didn't have those uh those images that stencil, but for other ones, uh a lot of them have just solid backgrounds, and I'll just switch colors around. And usually that's to show the client, and they pick what color they like, or they pick what what pose they like, or that can you add this? Can you do this from this period? And I'll just get you know, go back to the computer and get more pictures and put it on there, and then they approve it, and then I project it.

SPEAKER_06 31:50

Yeah, I did notice the similarity between the Atlanta one as far as printing and the and the Phoenix one. Um were similar in some ways, but like the Phoenix one had more, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_02 32:04

Phoenix one's bigger, it's a big wall. Um and Atlanta, the way I got to work in Atlanta was I paint murals for like the Black Black History Month murals. There's an uh an organization called Shining Light Foundation who um is run by a wonderful woman named Gisette Knight, and she um collects muralists that she knows do good work, and they line she lines us up with murals and started in Phoenix doing some murals here, and then um we do we uh donated our time the first year, and then the second year it was uh it was so popular that she began to to get sponsors, so she was able to pay us, and it just kept growing. So um it's called Black Black History. I am Black History, or Black History Matters, um, is usually on the on the murals themselves, and the Shining Light Foundation is is stuck on there too for reference. But the people in Atlanta, um I went over there to work on the Prince one was the first one. She started a branch out and have murals in Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Dallas. So she said Atlanta wants a Prince mural, and and they want very similar to what you did in Phoenix. Um definitely with this with the mirrored glasses. So I put a design together to fit that wall, and um worked out pretty well, I thought. Everybody seems to like it.

SPEAKER_04 33:50

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 33:51

But somebody did steal the glasses last uh last year, but they were replaced.

SPEAKER_04 34:05

I suppose that is an issue with public art um dealing with potential defacing and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 34:12

The public, yeah. The David Bowie Wall got tagged a few times, and I you know, I took care of that. Prince got a little little small tags, but lots of them. And I took care of that as well.

unknown 34:26

Check, check.

SPEAKER_06 34:28

Check, check. I hear you. Yeah, I've lost I've lost audio. Uh-oh. Can anybody hear me? Yes.

SPEAKER_01 34:38

I can hear.

SPEAKER_06 34:40

My mic is dead. Is it dead? No, I can hear you. Okay, awesome. Hopefully this will this will show up in the interview as well.

SPEAKER_01 34:51

Yeah, I can hear you, but there is a lot of interference around your voice.

unknown 34:56

Really? Wow, it's very quiet here.

SPEAKER_02 34:58

That's odd.

unknown 35:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 35:01

Well, it's nothing that's that's being played. It's it's like feedback or something.

SPEAKER_04 35:11

Hi, panning polish.

SPEAKER_06 35:22

He said he could hear.

SPEAKER_04 35:26

I was just saying hi to the person in the chat. It's somebody I know from Twitch.

SPEAKER_06 35:30

Oh, okay. My mic is showing. My mic level, okay. There it is. My mic level is back. Joys of going live. Yeah, pain glasses hiding. I hide that. All right. So, Maggie, what is the balance between planning and improvisation when you're working on a wall?

SPEAKER_02 36:14

Hmm. Kind of um 7325. Uh, I plan a lot, but if there's a if there's a time where I don't exactly have a plan, I'll just do what is planned, and then ideas come and I put those in as they develop. But it's mostly planning.

unknown 36:49

Nice.

SPEAKER_06 36:50

Can you walk us through uh your choices of materials and paints and your techniques?

SPEAKER_02 36:56

My materials?

SPEAKER_06 36:58

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 36:59

Well, like I said, I'm pretty old school. I use uh exterior latex paint, acrylics, nova color is a really good brand of acrylic paint. Really vibrant colors, and anything as far as paint brushes go. Just um, you know, the the cheap ones to the really expensive ones, you know, and rollers and things like that. I used to spray a lot when I was doing billboards with the big spray gun. Um, I don't do that much anymore. I use the spray gun for clear coat, but I did use a lot of airbrushing when I was restoring the carousel with horses.

SPEAKER_06 37:44

Yeah, I was always curious as to what a muralist would use on their murals.

SPEAKER_02 37:52

Well, lots of people, you know, use uh aerosol, and um, you know, you know that there's a lot of a lot of spray, a lot of really incredible control they can get from from their their spray tips. For me, I I don't like the fumes and you know just holding your finger in one position like that. When I was doing a lot of airbrushing, my finger would get stuck like that, and you know, I'd kind of have to work it out. But um, you know, I just use the sticks.

SPEAKER_03 38:30

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_06 38:33

So, Sam, speaking of paints and materials, you're also a name of a painter. Uh, can you tell us about your face-centered color-rich portraits and what role do these artworks play in your um broader creative expression?

SPEAKER_04 38:47

Sure. So, like for my personal paintings, I started out with acrylic and then I moved on to oil, so they're all all oil-based. But um Yeah, I was I saw this art exhibit when I was a teenager at the art institute. It was uh by a local artist named Matt Paschke. It was a retrospective of his work. And he would he would paint these big faces with lots of lines, and he he painted like Elvis and the Mona Lisa and all these other people. And that was really exciting to me. Seeing his work uh like really big and up close, that was uh really great. I and since he was local, I did get a chance to meet him and talk to him a few times, so that was great. But he was a huge impact on like my personal painting because I just really loved the way that faces communicate, you know, a whole bunch of emotions and ideas, just with the face. And so, yeah, kind of like what Maggie was saying, going through and looking for compelling photos. Um, I use a lot of um royalty-free images so I don't get in trouble. So um finding those, finding those photos that you look at and you just go, that's there's something there, there's something really exciting. And that starts that's the planning process, and then what happens from there is really kind of improvised. I do a lot of improvise as far as like the painting goes, because I'm not really sure exactly what's gonna happen, but I have an idea. But then I just kind of try things and retry things and just try to get it to something that I like, uh, and then I can finish it.

SPEAKER_02 40:19

Oils are the best, aren't they? Yeah, they're just so forgiving, they're so forgiving. I do a lot of my own work with oils too, like my own canvases. Yeah, that's my preference.

SPEAKER_06 40:33

Right. So, Maggie, where do you find your inspiration for your mural subjects and things? Or do people approach you about them first?

SPEAKER_02 40:43

Well, like I said, I I I wanted to do a Bowie wall, I wanted to do a Prince mural, and then um people would come and ask me if they could if I could paint something on their walls, and they it would be their ideas. Um very rarely does somebody say, Do what you want, you know. I kind of need to know what you would like to see, and then I would put something together and have them look at it. And they would send me pictures that they like, you know, and I would work that in. But yeah. But when I see like I'm struck, I'm struck by visual things that just sort of jump out at me like a juxtaposition of a strange, like a car fender against this this back, you know, this this concrete wall or and with that telephone pole, and and it'll the design will just jump out at me, and I'll think, uh I would like to paint that. And I'll usually pull up my phone and take a picture of whatever it is. And maybe someday down the road I'll paint it.

SPEAKER_04 41:52

Very cool.

SPEAKER_06 41:56

All right, so Sam, let's I know we said we wouldn't beat the people up with Prince tonight. We talked about Prince a little bit earlier, but um let's talk about the Prince era for just a minute. You spent a lot of time working closely with Prince as his webmaster and art director helping launch uh the MPG Music Club and packaging landmark albums like 31. What was that experience like creatively in person? Um can you walk us through that period? How did that opportunity present itself?

SPEAKER_04 42:27

Uh working with Prince, how'd that happen?

SPEAKER_06 42:29

Is that what you're asking?

SPEAKER_04 42:32

Yes. Okay, got it. Um well, you know, I was doing websites as a career uh early on, this is like the late 90s, so it was when the first internet bubble was happening. Uh, there's a lot of excitement around the internet, and also it was a time when musicians were kind of scared and record labels were scared of the internet because of Napster and people downloading, and there was all this fear that it was going to ruin the whole music scene. And people still argue today whether it did or not. But um, you know, I I started looking at websites and uh of different artists that were doing different things, and being a huge Prince fan, I started my own Prince website that I wanted to that I wanted to uh connect with other fans with. Uh connected with a lot of Chicago fans. We used to throw parties to get together. And then um I just kind of knew the people were doing the website before me and uh got connected to them to work on a new project. And then once that was done, uh I think Prince saw something and he pulled me on to the next project and then the next project, and then eventually we developed a relationship where I was starting to do more creative things for him, like albums or merchandise or tour books, uh editing photos, all those kinds of things. So it was really it was a gradual process, starting small and then getting much bigger later on. But um yeah, I think I think he just really liked working with me, and that was I was very fortunate. That that was the case.

unknown 44:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 44:01

So he that's awesome and I've heard people.

SPEAKER_04 44:04

What's that?

SPEAKER_02 44:05

I said that's awesome, and I'm very jealous.

SPEAKER_04 44:08

Thank you.

SPEAKER_06 44:11

So he pretty much sought you out. Is that how it worked?

SPEAKER_04 44:16

What's that? So he pretty much sought you out.

SPEAKER_06 44:18

Is that how it worked?

SPEAKER_04 44:20

Well, like there were other people who were working on web projects for him, but they didn't they didn't have the professional experience. So they were okay, but they weren't like next level. Prince wanted to take it to the next level. So that's kind of where I stepped in. Then we started throwing together ideas about how this could be a business and how we could use the internet to distribute his music. We could make our own music service. We didn't need to rely on anything. And this is this is like 2000, 2001. So this is really early, like even before iTunes was happening. Prince had this vision of distributing his music online, circumventing a record label. And that's what we set out to do.

SPEAKER_06 45:02

I hear you. Okay, I still feel as if my audio is not coming through. I'm not seeing any uh signal on my board here, but we'll keep going. See how it turns out. So, of course, we have to talk about uh your mural of the famous influence wall inside of Paisley Park in your studio A. How did that come about and uh what inspired it? Can you take us through that process? Was it all uh uh envision, or did you have any input as well?

SPEAKER_04 45:30

Um well it started uh it started in Vegas, actually, it started a little bit before that. Um an early version of Lotus Flower, the album, and there's the mural. Uh an early version of Lotus Flower had this picture that I made of Prince, you know, standing with his arms out against the Lotus Flower, and we were gonna use that as the album cover, but then he changed his mind and he wanted to do 3121 instead. So, and there you can see coming up is a picture of him with his arms out against the lotus flower. But once we got to Vegas, he said um we can we can reuse this, and so we actually were doing a lot of murals in Vegas uh in the backstage area. Like he just wanted to like make the backstage something special. So I was designing a lot of things. It was one of the things that was influencing us was um the Frank Miller comic Sin City with the high contrast black and white images. So we thought let's just take a bunch of influences, and he gave me a list of like who to get of people that inspired him, and also people that he went on and inspired through their music career. And so on the on the right side, you've got people that inspired him, and on the left, you have people like Wendy and Lisa and others that were inspired by him. Uh, and I was just literally searching on Google, just finding images. So none of that none of that is free from copyright or any of those things, and I think that's why they haven't released it or made a poster out of it. Um, it's just something private in Paisley Park that people enjoy now now on the tour, because it was done in probably 2007, and then the tours didn't happen until 2017. So uh for 10 years it just kind of was there, and if you knew about it, you knew about it. But I'm really glad that the tours now uh enable people to get to see it, and uh I like it.

SPEAKER_06 47:27

Oh, yeah, I took the tour in 2021, and it's one of the one of the things that caught my eye the most was that mural, and I was like, wow, I'm glad this is a stopping point. This is amazing.

SPEAKER_04 47:38

Well, thank you.

SPEAKER_02 47:39

Yeah, there was a question.

SPEAKER_04 47:42

Sure.

SPEAKER_02 47:43

Is that paint on the wall, or it's actually a it's uh it's a it's a vinyl wrap.

SPEAKER_04 47:52

Uh your your your nemesis.

SPEAKER_02 47:55

Right, right. Well, my brother used to work for the company that made the the material okay for a wall, so that's pretty.

SPEAKER_04 48:03

Yeah, Prince really got into these wall wraps for a period of time, and so I was designing them on the computer, making these huge files and showing it to him. Then we decided something that needed to have these guys come out and put it up. And there was there was talk even of expanding this one to like have it be the whole hallway with more, and I do have a version of it that it covers the whole hallway, but that never got to happen, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

Cool. So you didn't get to droop any paint on the floor, did you?

SPEAKER_04 48:32

No, not this time.

SPEAKER_06 48:36

That is awesome. So it all stem from the 3121 uh Vegas stint that he uh that he did. That's very cool. So after your work with Prince, uh you collaborated with artists like Pearl Jam, David Bowie, Gorillas, and even took some roles at Microsoft and Abby Magazine. How did you maintain your creative identity across such diverse platforms and clients like that?

SPEAKER_04 49:03

Well, when I when Prince and I were kind of done uh working together, um you know, I was looking for another artist to connect with, and uh fortunately that led to working with ProGam for a couple years. And the creative process was very different with them, like they weren't very hands-on, they weren't very a part of it. Um so I would kind of hear directions from third parties or their manager. I mean, we're all we were all in the same building, but I just wouldn't see them that much. Uh so that was different. So I do adjust, and I I was a little more like um given a lot more freedom to just kind of do whatever, and then they take a look at and decide if they want to use it. And then uh I got connected to like some promotional companies, and they would connect me to Gorillas and David Bowie, like you're saying, and um, I did a bunch of small projects for for them, and then uh currently I'm working with Avril Levine on what she's doing, and so that's been interesting too, because we communicate a lot um online and texting and phone calls, and so that's very different than with Prince. But she's been uh fun to work with too, just because she has a very defined aesthetic, so I get to play around with that. Um yeah, it's been fun.

SPEAKER_06 50:18

I imagine. So I guess this is for the both of you. Um, what's the most physically or technically challenged challenging piece you've ever worked on?

SPEAKER_01 50:29

Physically challenging piece?

SPEAKER_06 50:32

Yeah, or technically.

SPEAKER_02 50:34

Whoa, I can barely hear you.

SPEAKER_06 50:37

Yeah, that's I'm having problems with my audio. I knew I was having problems. Um can you hear me now?

SPEAKER_02 50:42

Yeah, yeah, but you said what was the most physically challenging piece, right?

unknown 50:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 50:49

That would be the first prince in Phoenix because it was so tall and I had a scaffold, but it didn't get me to the top. So I needed to improvise and I felt a little bit like a lock walker sometimes. So yeah, plus the heat um in Phoenix is pretty what's the word? Off putting. I worked from May to June on that, so I dealt with some heat.

SPEAKER_04 51:26

Yeah, no doubt.

SPEAKER_06 51:30

What about you, Sam?

SPEAKER_04 51:33

Uh I don't really have any um physical issues I gotta worry about. The you know, because I work almost entirely from my desk. So the I think the biggest issue for me is not gaining like 400 pounds um just sitting around on my desk all day. Uh but excuse me. But yeah, um it there's long hours and there's uh you know a lot of pushing things around on the computer, so um it can get taxing to some degree. Not the same thing as uh being up on a scaffold and doing that kind of work, but um yeah, it has its own challenges.

SPEAKER_02 52:12

When I sit at the computer, I get a really sore wrist. Do you ever get a sore wrist?

SPEAKER_04 52:20

Well, you know, you gotta you gotta play around with different mice, I think, because like the mouse tool, you know, you you have to get one that kind of fits with your style. There's different ones that are like taller and wider, and um, or or you can just use a stylus, you know, which just functions like a pen or a paintbrush. You know, just get a small tablet and then just use it as a mouse with the stylus, and uh that works too. We do a lot with the stylus.

SPEAKER_06 52:51

Uh painting polish has a question. Our question is for Maggie. Curious uh how Maggie scales murals uh to a certain degree.

SPEAKER_02 53:02

Oh, um I'm just fascinated by by people that do those doodle grids. I'm trying to wrap my brain around how that works, but I use a projector. So I get it up there as fast as I can. And the projector has been the answer for me.

SPEAKER_04 53:21

Yeah, it makes sense.

SPEAKER_06 53:25

But yeah, maybe she maybe she missed that part. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 53:39

As far as scale goes? I'll take a picture of the of the building and then put all the pictures into that little rectangle so I know that when I project it up there, it's gonna it's gonna fall into that space.

SPEAKER_04 53:57

Yeah, I was doing the same thing with the murals at Paisley Park, taking pictures of all the different rooms and the walls, um, and then just basically drawing on the walls in on the computer.

SPEAKER_06 54:09

Uh-huh. Yeah. So who chose that wall, Sam? Was that you or was that Prince or somebody else?

SPEAKER_04 54:17

That was that was Prince. That was right outside Studio A. So that's Studio A is the main you know, center of Paisley Park, essentially, as far as recording goes. So he wanted it right outside the doors of Studio A.

SPEAKER_06 54:32

So in Sorry. This is where the both of you have you ever had to completely change a mural or anything mid-project?

SPEAKER_05 54:43

I'm sure you have.

SPEAKER_02 54:53

I don't think I have.

SPEAKER_05 54:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 54:58

Um maybe something will occur to me later. I'll remember something later, but I can't think of oh, usually when it's projected up there, that's what it's gonna be.

unknown 55:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 55:17

What about you, Tim? You ever had to change anything?

SPEAKER_04 55:20

Oh yeah. Um, yeah, like it like I was mentioning about the Lotus Flower album. We did a whole package for it, uh, photos, design, everything, and then he's like, No, I don't want to do that. Let's do 3121 instead. So I just kind of had to archive Lotus Flower and put it away, save the images, which wound up later in the uh inspiration wall. But but yeah, there's a lot of stuff that I worked on with him where he just kind of wanted to see ideas and he just kind of wanted to play around, and maybe it was gonna get released, maybe it wasn't, but he had me at his disposal so he could just try stuff. So there's plenty of things that I have digitally that I've never seen the light of day publicly is so maybe one day I'll open a museum.

SPEAKER_06 56:05

Yeah, I mean I'm sure you've got some treasures that no one's uh ever seen that they would love to see, I'm sure. Yeah, definitely. Um can either of you share a behind-the-scenes story from one of your most memorable projects, something like behind the scenes it would be interesting.

SPEAKER_04 56:25

That's one of the other hand a behind the scenes uh what's that?

SPEAKER_06 56:31

Yeah, it's uh I was asking if you could share a behind-the-scenes story from one of your most memorable projects.

SPEAKER_04 56:38

Well, I guess for me, the most memorable thing is um Prince really over time, as Prince and I grew our friendship, he wanted to meet my family, and he wanted to meet uh my wife and my young daughter, who was uh you know, a toddler age at that time. So he uh he would bring them out to LA with me sometimes, and we would all hang out at the house, have dinner together, um listen to music, whatever. And there was one time uh a fond memory that stands out is uh my daughter, who's probably like three at the time, we were eating dinner, she was getting kind of antsy, so Prince said, You know, you guys stay and finish your dinner. I'm gonna I'll take her and I'll show her the hair salon. Because of course he had a hair salon in his house, and uh so they go and they're they're doing whatever, and then all of a sudden, out from the the doorway comes uh my daughter with a head-to-toe wig on, basically looks like cousin it from Adam's family, and she runs around the table a couple times, and Prince is off on this on the side laughing, and we all just got a big kick out of that. But you know, special moments like that are are the ones that really last. And my daughter has no memory of it, of course. She's 22 now.

SPEAKER_02 58:00

Well, my behind-the-scenes activities can't hold a candle to yours. The only behind-the-scenes things that I've I've got is from being a court sketch artist when I would uh end up in the elevator with people like Joe Arpaio. Um when I was sketching him, and our conversations were kind of kind of humorous. Talking to the bad guys.

SPEAKER_04 58:27

Sounds really interesting.

SPEAKER_02 58:28

Yeah, Joe Arpayo wanted to know why I always make him look like the devil.

SPEAKER_05 58:35

Right.

SPEAKER_02 58:36

That was a good one.

SPEAKER_06 58:41

So has a viewer's reaction uh ever deeply moved or surprised either again? The viewer's reaction ever deeply moved or surprised either again?

SPEAKER_02 58:58

Yes. When I finished the David Bowie mural, uh a family pulled up. I was down there uh looking at it with a couple of friends, and then a family pulled into the parking lot there and got out, and there wasn't like a grandfather of this family. Got out of the car and stood there and started to cry. And I was kind of I couldn't believe that he David Boy meant so much to so many people that you know some people would say, Oh, he he changed my life, I was gonna commit suicide, and then I heard his music, um, things like that. That just blows me away, and I'm really I'm grateful that I that I was able to um give them something to look at and appreciate.

SPEAKER_06 59:55

For sure. Anything for you, Sam, on that one? What's that?

SPEAKER_04 1:00:03

Anything for you uh as a reaction to the people um well see no since I was working on these commercial projects, and a lot of people saw them and had been affected. I I did see a couple um tattoos of some of my work, which was interesting. Um but I think actually it's I think the inspiration wall has really been something special because I hear a lot of stories about people take the tour and they see the wall and they're really kind of blown away by it. Because it's it's not something that's out in the public, it's not something that um you can get a poster of, it's something that you can only see at Paisley Park. So when people go to Paisley Park, they tend to be kind of in awe in general because it's you know Prince's chocolate factory, basically, it's just this wild Prince place, but uh then to see that um as a highlight, I think that's been really special for me.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:02

Yeah, I think one of these days I'll get there.

SPEAKER_06 1:01:05

All right.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:06

Never been there, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:01:08

Yeah, whether you're whether you're a fan or not, you've got to get amazing. Once you walk through those doors, whether you're a fan or not, I always say it hits you hard. You can feel his presence there. Yeah, when I when I saw that mural on the top of Paisley Park, I was one of those people. I was I was emotional. And first thing that came to my mind was oh, I've got to have this in my mankid.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:39

Right. Paisley Park asked me about uh the images if if we secured copyright, and I just told them now it's all bootleg stuff, like there's no way it's gonna be legal to sell. Yeah, so so that kind of makes it a little extra special though, because it like I said, it's only something you can see what if you actually go to Paisley Park.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:01

That's a reason to go for sure, I would say. So, how do you both keep growing and challenging yourself artistically? What was that? How do you both keep growing and challenging yourself artistically?

SPEAKER_04 1:02:26

Um, I think for me a lot of it is getting inspired by the people I work with, um and also just being exposed to culture and things that are going on and music, of course, is is a huge part of my life and getting inspired by that. So you know, just kind of being out there and and open to new ideas.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:50

Ditto.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:52

Ditto here's a fun one.

unknown 1:02:56

Here's a fun one.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:56

If either of you could create a mural anywhere in the world, uh where would it be and what would it depict?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:06

Anywhere in the world. That's a hard one. I wouldn't mind going to Hawaii and painting a nice undersea water mural.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:26

That would be nice.

SPEAKER_06 1:03:33

There would only be one way to see that. Yep.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:39

Snorkeling, it's the best.

unknown 1:03:42

I have not tried it.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:44

Take the GoPro underwater, get pictures of turtles, that's great.

SPEAKER_06 1:03:54

Anything for you, Sam? Where would you like to see one of your uh pieces in the world?

SPEAKER_04 1:03:59

Um yeah, if I if I could create something that could get blown up really big, um, I guess I'd like to put it in New York City, just because there's there's so much beautiful uh public art there already. Nice to be a part of that, I think.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:15

There's a company in New York called Colossal Media. Have you heard of them?

SPEAKER_04 1:04:20

No.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:22

Um well they are literally recreating the old school way of billboard painting only on walls. So there's a slight difference, I guess, but they're doing the exact same process that I did when I was a billboard painter and just you know putting it on the walls for different advertisers and things like that. I would also like to have a piece of New York. That's my hometown. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:49

Yeah, I'm a big fan of uh Shepard Ferry and the stuff that he does. So singing his name's Shepard Ferry. He does the obey stuff. Um, but he's got some stuff in New York which I really like, so that kind of inspired me.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:04

I was blown away by a guy named Chuck Close, who he's got some he's got some work in the subways uh down there. Huge photorealistic faces. He was one of my first influences.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:18

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:28

I don't remember seeing that many videos in New York.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:31

What's that? Can you hear me? Yes. Okay.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:35

I don't know if it's I don't know if you're getting the microphone audio or you're getting the bathroom.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:42

Yeah. I'm hearing I'm hearing a whine.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:47

It's like you kind of fade in and fade out.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:51

Let me let me try unplugging my mic.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:54

Okay.

SPEAKER_06 1:06:07

Check, check, check.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:09

I hear you.

unknown 1:06:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:15

It's about that wine around.

SPEAKER_06 1:06:19

I don't know what's going on. I get a surprise. Every time I do a new new show, it's a new surprise. Yep. Yeah, I was gonna say when I was in New York, I didn't see a lot of murals. Maybe I was in the wrong area.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:34

Possibly. Yeah, it's maybe you didn't know there were murals because that was just advertisements.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:40

You know.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:42

If you go down around the like the arts district, it's places like that, there's a lot of really huge art murals. Just for art, not advertising vodka or anything.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:06:55

I know there's an art district in Miami, which is really cool to see.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:00

I've seen pictures of that area. That's amazing.

SPEAKER_06 1:07:06

Sam, I think I read somewhere you drew inspiration from Prince's dedication to creativity without limits. How does that continue to guide your work today?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:17

Well, um, another great part about working with him is that uh he he gave you opportunities to try different things, try new things. So, for instance, um he was between photographers and he said, Well, why don't you get the camera and see what you can do? So I got to do a photo shoot with Prince, um, just kind of for fun. And and those photos have never been released. I have them, but they haven't been put out to the public. But it's something he gave me the opportunity to do, and then he he found Afshin, who does it who did a great job for him, but he at least he let me try, at least he let me do it. And there was I talk of like maybe working on a video, doing some video stuff. So there was a lot of a lot of room for growth. Basically, you just saw creativity as something in and of itself, not strictly connected to one medium, not strictly connected to one channel. Uh, so I really appreciated that for sure.

SPEAKER_06 1:08:16

Very nice. So the big question is what's next for the both of you?

SPEAKER_02 1:08:28

Well, since it's over 150 degrees out here, I'm not doing very many murals outside. Um but coming up, I have a mural, and um I believe I was just contacted about an indoor mural that that should be nice to do in this weather. So yeah, life goes on.

SPEAKER_06 1:08:56

Life does go on. Um what's gonna be the theme of that mural, you know? Sorry, what was that? What's gonna be the theme of that mural that's coming up for Maggie?

SPEAKER_02 1:09:07

Me?

SPEAKER_06 1:09:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:09

Um in September I'll be doing an Emmett Till mural for uh Shining Light Foundation. I I did a design back in January, and um and uh I have a couple of changes to make to it. Uh Emmett Till's family was looking at the at the design, so that's what I'll be doing in September. What's that?

unknown 1:09:41

I'm looking forward to that.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:45

I miss that. I can't hear anything. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:10:16

What about now, Maggie?

SPEAKER_01 1:10:18

Yeah, I feel better.

SPEAKER_06 1:10:21

Yeah, I was only saying that I'm looking definitely looking forward to the one you're doing in September.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:27

Oh, yeah. Hopefully it it'll be a little cooler, but not by much.

unknown 1:10:35

What about you, Sam?

SPEAKER_04 1:10:40

Sorry, could you repeat?

SPEAKER_02 1:10:43

I think you said what about you?

SPEAKER_04 1:10:45

Oh, okay. Um uh we just finished a big tour with Abril Levine, so there's a lot of creative stuff to do for that. Uh, she's back home. She's probably taking a break for a little while, but uh hopefully there'll be a new album soon. I worked on the last two. So getting to work on that project should be a lot of fun. I hope that uh happens sooner than later. And then I also work at uh at an agency here in LA, so I keep myself busy uh with that too.

SPEAKER_06 1:11:20

Are you doing um web work or graphic design work at OTA? Web work what I was just asking if you're doing web work or very loud. I give it a test, test, test. Yeah. Test, test, test. Look.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:01

There you go.

SPEAKER_06 1:12:02

Uh I don't think any of my audio came through tonight. I I just realized I had the the 48 volt button off. Oh yeah, that'll be joys of going live. Yeah, this is gonna be something to see on the playback, man. It may be a keeper, it may not. Oh well. You could overdub your questions. Yeah, that's gonna be difficult to do, but yeah, that's that's a thought.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:31

Well, we can do it again.

SPEAKER_06 1:12:33

Yeah, we can do it again. I've got somebody joining in late, DJ Gemini. Dang, I missed it.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:41

Yeah, he's another friend of mine from Twitch.

SPEAKER_06 1:12:44

Okay, his mic is not working correctly. Yeah, we just figured that out.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:49

Yeah, Gemini's a really talented uh professional DJ.

SPEAKER_06 1:12:55

Okay, awesome. What's up, DJ Gemini? Thanks for joining. Well, now that we figured that out at the very end of the interview, we that's a whole lot better. Yeah, I don't know what I was thinking. I've been looking down on my board all night. I'm like, what could it be? What could it be? What could it be?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:16

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_06 1:13:17

The 48 volt button, as always. Okay. When it works, yeah, joys of going live without a net. I love it. Wow. Well, we will see what we get and uh hope for the best. But I think that's gonna put us at the finish line, guys. I really appreciate you coming on tonight. How can um the audience stay connected with you and support your work? Where can they find you guys online?

SPEAKER_04 1:13:48

Uh they could they could find me at samjennings.com or on Instagram, samjennings3000. Uh, those are good. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:00

And I'm on Facebook and Instagram. Instagram is at Maggie Keynes Art with a Z, Z-A-R-T. And um, if you look me up on Facebook, I have a whole section of murals and art and my so-class.

SPEAKER_06 1:14:18

All right, nice, nice, nice, nice. Um, wow, I'm really bombed about this audio. We will move forward, see what we get. Maybe we can do it again if it didn't uh if it didn't take. But uh anyway, that wraps up today's conversation with the incredible Maggie Keene and Sam Jennings. I hope you guys um enjoyed hearing their stories, insights, and creative journeys as much as I enjoyed sharing them with you. If you were inspired by what you heard, be sure to follow their work and continue supporting their art. So, once again, guys, I thank you so much for joining. I'm gonna drop you out real quick and I'm gonna go over some music news, and then uh we will talk to you guys later. But thank you so much again for joining, and uh we'll stay in touch.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:03

Well, thank you, and it was great meeting you, Sam.

SPEAKER_06 1:15:06

Great meeting you too. All right, guys, have a great night. Bye-bye. All right, there you have it, folks. The great Maggie Key, Sam Jennings. Um speaking of art, I don't know if any of you guys were paying attention paying attention to Sheila E's uh social media page, but she's um uh announcing her debut art collection. And uh she says she is excited to announce that her debut art collection, Imagination Collection, is back and it's more exclusive than ever. Uh this collection features seven stunning, one-of-a-kind pieces, each created through a powerful live drum performance and enhanced using cutting edge light base technology. Every piece is part of a limited edition, individually numbered, and personally signed by Stila. She says you can own it, frame it, and hang it. For more details to secure your piece today. Visit stelaeart.com and I have a video that coincides with that. Let's take a look real quick. Sorry about the uh the audio quality tonight. Hopefully it will come through uh during the playback. If not, then maybe we can do this again sometime soon. I don't want to put these guys through the trouble anytime soon. But uh we shall see. Maybe I can do some editing to make it better. We shall see what we get. But anyway, if you enjoy this podcast, uh don't forget to subscribe to the channel. Um over on uh YouTube, uh I'm over on uh Instagram, TikTok, and I have a Facebook group all under the handle uh freak eponymous podcast. Um if you leave if you love today's show, leave a comment and a like. It really helps us keep these inspiring conversations coming your way. So until next time, as I always say, live, love, and dream, y'all. Thanks for watching. Peace.