MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) - Reggie Wayne stood alongside his childhood idol and thought about how the last time he was in this position was some two decades and two feet ago. Then, he was an excitable 10-year-old kid attending Penny Hardaway’s basketball camp. And now here he stood in Memphis’ gleaming basketball facility, handing Hardaway his artistic tribute to the Tigers coach.
Wayne’s mixed-media piece depicts Hardaway crouching in a bright blue Memphis State uniform against a glittering background of white, orange and blue hues. Look long enough and subtle yet recognizable scrawls emerge: the words “Memphis” and “Penny,” as well as Hardaway’s iconic 1 Cent logo.
It is Hardaway memorialized as Wayne remembers him, a role model for young Tigers fans growing up in Memphis.
Wayne, 33, is a Memphis native and mixed-media artist who now lives in Virginia. A huge Tigers devotee, he still has photos of himself and Hardaway at various summer camps. In one photo taken in 1996, Hardaway grins from a blue chair as young Wayne, swimming in a white camp T-shirt, places his hand on Hardaway’s shoulder.
The two men posed for another photo this week, flanked by mannequins wearing Tigers uniforms and holding Wayne’s artwork between them.
“He took a pic with a million kids so I know he didn’t remember me, but it was just a cool moment about 25 years later,” Wayne said. “Not a role reversal, exactly, but for me to present him with something was a cool, full-circle moment.”
The Hardaway piece is something Wayne has wanted to create for more than two years, and in August he finally found the time and motivation to do so. It took him two weeks to convert the photo of Hardaway onto a 30-by-40-inch canvas and layer materials around it, starting with an acrylic background before adding texture with items including colored glass and pennies.
“I freestyle,” Wayne said of his creative process. “Sometimes I can overwork it and put too much in it or sometimes not enough, but that piece is probably one of my best pieces. The colors flowed, the different colors of glass, the stones I used, the pennies, the copper, everything just flowed.”
After he finished the piece on Aug. 14, Wayne posted a photo on Instagram with a caption asking his Memphis network to help spread word to Hardaway.
The 901 connection came through. Hardaway eventually reached out to Wayne via Instagram to exchange phone numbers, and a few weeks later Wayne flew to Memphis to visit his family and hand deliver the artwork.
Wayne, a Germantown High graduate whose cousin is former Memphis player Lorenzen Wright, remembers having artistic talent as a kid but lacking the patience or passion to pursue it. What he was passionate about was Tigers basketball, and Hardaway specifically. He loved Hardaway’s signature Nike shoes and the classic mid-90’s Lil’ Penny commercials. When Hardaway started a trend by rocking a Band-Aid above his left eye at All-Star weekend, Wayne sported one, too.
Despite his attendance at Hardaway’s basketball camps, Wayne’s own hoops career never quite took off. It wasn’t until recently that his art career did.
In 2018, two years after Wayne’s job with Norfolk Southern led him from Tennessee to Virginia, the nomadic and sometimes lonely lifestyle turned him back towards art. His creative work soon “took on a life of its own,” and he now spends time balancing his day job with life as an artist.
Wayne isn’t afraid of using non-traditional materials - tree branches, money, glass - and draws inspiration from culture and from his imagination.
“You learn that trying to create for others will hurt you in the long run,” he said. “If you create for yourself it just comes out better, so I try to create pieces that I would want to see and try to be a little different and out of the box.”
Wayne has created similar works paying homage to Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and rapper Nipsey Hussle, but Wednesday was the first time he got to meet the subject of one of his pieces. He and Hardaway traded questions, Hardaway inquiring about art and Wayne asking about the Tigers’ upcoming season.
Wayne is especially ecstatic about Memphis’ addition of freshman Moussa Cisse and a glut of transfer players, declaring, “I definitely think college basketball is sleeping on the Tigers. I think we’ve got a good chance to win the conference and make a run in the tournament, for sure. I think we got some game changers.”
When it comes to basketball, perhaps the Tigers can benefit from adopting the same philosophy Wayne applies to his art.
“You can tell when people put their mind to it and their heart to it,” he said. “It just comes out better.”
It certainly doesn’t hurt.
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Artist delivers tribute to Hardaway, his childhood idol - Washington Times
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