Michael Hopkins (1956 - 2021, Chicago, IL) remembered always having a knack for drawing, but it wasn’t until later in life that he took up art making in earnest.

 

A self-taught artist, Michael created breezy, colorful portraits of jazz, rock-and-roll, and blues musicians, soul singers and pop icons, and all manner of faces that spoke to his wide-ranging interests.

 

Michael’s watercolor paintings are popular with visitors to the Project Onward studio, where a collection of his small vibrant portraits looms on the wall over his work table and forms a virtual tour of the history of American music.

 

Towards the end of his life, Michael was working on larger paper, and he often mounted his portraits on cardboard cutouts for a dramatic and lifelike effect. Michael Hopkins was in the three-person exhibition Old School at Project Onward’s Spotlight Gallery.