Ted Ellis (born 1963) is an American artist and former environmental chemist. Ellis is best known for his African-American themed art and styles which blend elements of folk art, naturalism and impressionism. His personal rendition of Barack Obama in acrylic, Obama, the 44th President, was presented in honor of the 2009 Presidential Inauguration.
Ellis' art business has sold over 1.75 million fine art products, and he works with a number of prominent corporations. He is also known for his community work, especially advancing arts in children's education.
Personal life and early career
Born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, to a professional musician-father and a housewife-mother, Ellis' earliest hints of artistic talent began to show at five-years-old. Ellis' first attempt at art was a third-grade freehand sketch of a dog from Archie Comics, which he drew so accurately that friends and family believed it had been traced. Growing up, one of his favorite characters to draw was Wile E. Coyote, and as an adult he continues to enjoy comic books as "refreshing".
When he was old enough, Ellis would ride the bus alone to downtown New Orleans so as to be exposed to and spend time with the area artists. He and his friends would in their spare time compete with one another to see who could draw the best designs, and Ellis continued developing his art skills throughout primary school despite only receiving "satisfactory" marks in art class. In elementary school he attended a summer program at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, and later attended an after-school program at Lawless High School. Ellis says that he knew he wanted to be an artist in the seventh grade, and credits his teacher in that class for keeping him focused.
Ellis worked for a time with charcoal and pastel before settling on oil and acrylic. He took art classes during high school and enrolled in four months of private art lessons, but is otherwise self-taught. Ellis followed advice from Anna Torregano, his mentor, friend and high school art teacher, and his parents, all of whom advised him to pursue an academic career so as not to become a "starving artist". His mother especially stressed university and earning a professional degree.
Ellis earned a B.Sc. in chemistry at Dillard University on a United States Army ROTC scholarship as well as academic scholarship, and went on to be commissioned a second lieutenant in the United States Army's Field Artillery Branch. Ellis spent the next ten years working in the field of chemistry, eight years of which were as an environmental chemist at Rollins Engineering Services.
Ellis has lived in Louisiana and California and currently resides in Friendswood, Texas with his wife, Erania. They have a daughter, Chaney, and a son, Tanner. Chaney is an aspiring rap artist and has produced a parent-friendly CD about school and drugs titled Off the Chain.
Art career
Ellis maintained a passion for art that preceded his professional art career; he painted throughout his time in the Army and as an environmental chemist, generally working out of a studio in his garage. His first commissions were produced for two co-workers at Rollins. They had wanted to purchase the piece that he was then working on, but he refused and instead offered to paint them two similar pieces, which they purchased for $40.
When he first got started, Ellis passed on an opportunity to do work for the J. C. Penney catalog because he was too busy, but ultimately found success in a similar publication.
Ellis published his first prints through Market Arts' Dan Rose in Houston, but his art career took off when he noticed that his wife's Avon boutique magazine, targeted at African-Americans, lacked any art. He sent Avon a proposal which they accepted, and through the magazine he sold 42,610 signed prints of Thee Baptism. Since he was still working as an engineer at the time, he autographed the tens-of-thousands of prints during his lunch-break.
After quitting his job as an engineer in 1996, Ellis competed against 500 others for, and won, a 1998 Walt Disney Studios commission for art in honor of Black History Month. The piece was used in the 1999 celebration at Epcot Center and appeared on T-shirts, souvenir-mugs, and posters.
Art Business
Ellis has marketed and sold his art throughout his career. He was monetizing his creative talents in high school when he and his classmates sold their custom designed T-shirts, first to their school's juniors and seniors, and then throughout the school district.
In building his art business over two decades, Ellis engaged in fact-finding missions in search of financial patrons and customers at art festivals, conventions, reunions and libraries, as well as local businesses. Ellis incorporated his business in 1991. He credits his time at Rollins for teaching him that "if you have a quality product and a good form of distribution, you'll succeed".
When he started, Ellis quickly realized that talent was not alone enough after he had to approach 30–40 galleries until he was picked up by two, one of which closed down. He says that "it's a lot of marketing, planning, exhibiting and a lot of rejection".
Ellis' wife Erenia, a loan officer, manages his business, "T. Ellis Art, Incorporated", out of a League City, Texas studio. Ellis has sold more than 1.75 million fine art products across the country through direct sales, art galleries, catalog outlets, fine art dealers, and licensing, and has marketed community partnership opportunities meant to educate and empower communities by offering maximum returns on minimal investments. In 2005 he signed for representation with art licensing agency "Alaska Momma" with the intent of opening new merchandising avenues in home décor, furnishings, calendars, apparel and stationery.
Ellis has affiliated with and had art commissioned by corporations like Walt Disney Studios, Minute Maid, Coca-Cola, Marathon Oil, ExxonMobil, State Farm Insurance, Merck Pharmaceutical, J. C. Penney, Southland Corporation, and Avon Products, Philip Morris USA and Integrity Music.
Ellis' works have been sold through Army and Air Force Exchange Service catalogs and were available exclusively both through Avon's African American Boutique as well as their core brochures.
One of his first major sales was of an original depicting a God-like surgeon in an operating-room, sold to the surgeon. Ellis' art has sold for prices ranging from $750 to $30,000.
While Ellis initially had hoped to build his business up to Fortune 500 stature, he now finds satisfaction in "helping others through art".
Hurricane Katrina
Ellis and his wife are both natives of New Orleans, and much of his art along with his passion for art are inspired by the vibrant city. As a young man, he would search the colorful French Quarter for subjects to paint. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the devastation of parts of the city, the city's role in his art drastically changed so as to reflect the story of hope and rebirth that he saw in the disaster.
On the night before the storm hit Louisiana, the Ellis home in Texas was a refuge for 10 New Orleans families, 50 people in all. After the storm, Ellis helped fly home friends stranded outside New Orleans, and he organized colleagues in the art community behind the relief effort.
Ellis was allowed to enter the city two weeks after the flood waters subsided in order to survey the damage to his mother's home in the Lower Ninth Ward and salvage her possessions. While travelling among the destroyed houses and deserted city, Ellis witnessed a lone man repairing his home's roof. The contrast resonated with Ellis, and he memorialized the hope he saw in the man's actions through his piece Surviving Katrina. The scene is of rising floodwater that traps a family on their house's roof while the father holds up the Flag of the United States, a flag that to Ellis symbolizes the need for the nation to come together to aid those affected by the storm.
In Life Begins Anew, a father holds a baby above floodwaters while another man reaches out to take the child. Ellis describes the scene as symbolizing the promise of a new beginning for those who survived Katrina and its aftermath.
As its title indicates, the Katrina: The Hope, Healing and Rebirth of New Orleans collection was for Ellis about showing the power of art to assist the healing process: "The largest piece I did is about how life begins anew and how a person can find hope even after such devastation. I want this work to be uplifting, to be a fresh breath of life for the community."
Obama Portrait
One of Ellis' more famous works is an abstract depiction of Barack Obama's signature 'hope' pose. Ellis painted the portrait in honor of Obama's 2008 Presidential inauguration. In Obama, the 44th President, Ellis uses red, blue, yellow, and green acrylic paint to portray Obama as someone who unites people across lines of color, ethnicity, and religion.
The piece was presented at a January 19, 2009, gala held by the National Black Chamber of Commerce and the National Newspaper Publishers Association Foundation at the Embassy of France in Washington, D.C. The proceeds from the autographed prints sold at the event supported NNPA Foundation and the Howard University School of Communications Building Fund (NNPA Media Wing).
African-American history
In 2009, Ellis produced an exhibit focusing on the theme of African-American history in light of slavery and emancipation. The exhibit, American Slavery: The Reason Why We're Here, tied into the Juneteenth commemoration of slavery's abolition in the State of Texas. It was located at and included tours of the historic residence of horticulturist Henry Stringfellow, an innovator in organic gardening who was enlightened in how he employed of freedmen. Ellis began the series of works at a 2006 exhibition at the same house.
The exhibit's more than 20 paintings were painted with brush and fingers, and Ellis sometimes added a collage of documents. The exhibit included images of the transportation of slaves, the industry of slavery in crop production, and the abolition of slavery.
The painting Free At Last includes depictions of Buffalo soldiers, Harriet Tubman, the year "1865", a mighty oak, and in the background, their heads bowed in prayer, the figures of the current owner and restorer of the house, Sam Collins III, and his wife and children. The exhibit also displayed Ellis' famous depiction of Barack Obama, Obama, the 44th President.
Ellis' art was featured at a 2011 exhibition at the Rosa Parks Library and Museum. The Museum, at Troy University in Montgomery, Alabama, hosted the exhibit, called Our History, Heritage, and Culture: An American Story, the Art of Ted Ellis, as part of its celebration of Black History Month.Artist Ted Ellis Partners with the Rosa Parks Museum at Troy University to Celebrate Black History Houston, TX (PRWEB) January 14, 2011
Ellis has been pictorially documenting African-American lifestyle, history and culture for thirty years. Ellis paintings are in the permanent collection of the DuSable museum, Charles Wright museum, the McKenna museum, Free People of Color Museum, and the Amistad Research Center. The City of Selma, Alabama, commissioned Ellis as the official artist for the 50th anniversary for the civil rights march, known as "Bloody Sunday". The City and County of Galveston, Texas, recognized Ellis for the 150th anniversary of Juneteenth. The Juneteenth Freedom Project was exhibited at the State Capitol in Washington, DC at the U.S. Senate Rotunda and House of Representatives Rayburn Building. President Barack Obama and the First Lady, Michelle Obama of the White House has thanked Ellis for his art and giving.