Ben Zen -quick gesture drawing of Ben Hogan

-a quick gestural drawing of Ben Hogan done in ink, then digitally layered atop an image of his scorecard from the 100th Open Championship at Royal Birkdale Golf Club.

Visit sasgolf.com to see all my available limited edition golf art prints.

drawing of Ben Hogan Putting

drawing by Steven Anthony Salerno -visit sasgolf.com

Here is a simple oil crayon drawing I recently created depicting superstar iconic golfer in history Ben Hogan, seen in his putting posture about to strike the ball. 

I probably made about five of these relatively quick line drawings before getting it just right.... Because I created each drawing by directly making marks with the crayon on paper without any preliminary light pencil sketch underneath as a guide, I made errors in proportions, or errors in line angles, etc... so it took until the 5th attempt before I got it all done to my satisfaction. Even still, as you can see, the "final" image is purposely rough looking, as I was seeking a very impromptu "sketch" feel for the drawing. (I used photo reference)

I liked this frontal view of Hogan, with his neck and head bent down, because his trademark white cap is seen directly from the top, which is an interesting perspective as it lends a slightly abstract shape into the overall image.

Click here to see a previous post of another drawing I created of Ben Hogan.

Process: I scanned the crayon drawing (which was done on a buff colored raw paper) into Photoshop, where I then added simple washes of digital color for the pants, sweater, and cap.

As you can see from the drawing, Mr. Hogan's putting style was to play the ball lined up off of his left toe, take a slightly closed stance (right foot dropped back a bit from the ball/target line)  plus he then also pulled the putter back to an inside path using a very wristy-hinged stroke to "rap" the ball, which is in comparison to a longer smoother pendulum-stroke technique most Tour players use today.

I must have been channeling another Ben when I made this drawing.... the great American artist Ben Shahn (1898 -1969) because the simple black line I employed, along with the red lettering reminds me a bit this artist's social realism graphic works from the 1930's and '40's. 

Visit sasgolf.com to view my limited edition golf art prints and original paintings and sketches available for purchase.

work in progress: Majors Chart

Currently I am in the middle of working on a rather ambitious new golf art image... one that I had been wanting to create for some time now, and am just now getting to it. 

There are 27 golfers in history who have won four or more of golf's major championship tournament victories. We all know that Jack Nicklaus is at the top of the chart with an astounding 18 major championship wins, followed by Tiger Woods with 14 major championship wins. When Tiger had reached his 14th major victory a handful of years ago, everyone in the golf world assumed it would not be much longer before he cruised past Jack's record. But in lieu of Tiger's fall from grace, drop in world golf ranking's and the rebuilding of his golf swing over the past few years (which has brought him back up into the top 3 in the rankings), Tiger's status regarding whether or not he can match or surpass Jack's landmark of 18 major victories has been fractured. Will he win more majors? It remains to be seen... Certainly he will win more majors, but can he win 4 more? 5 more?

drawing of Harry Vardon by Steven Anthony Salerno

The artwork I am creating is a swing portrait of each of these 27 players, consisting of a small black crayon drawing embellished with a simple tonal wash of neutral color, all of which will then be designed into a kind of descending order performance chart within one of my limited edition art prints. I just think it will be interesting to see at a glance all the players within one visual which puts their major tournament accomplishments into perspective. 

drawing of Ben Hogan by Steven Anthony Salerno

Of the 27 players on the list, only 3 are still active and can potentially add more major victories to their record: Tiger Woods (14), Phil Mickelson (4) and Ernie Els (4). And, as you all know, a few years ago Tom Watson almost won the Open Championship yet again, which would have elevated his record of 8 major victories up to 9 (tying Ben Hogan and Gary Player) but a bogey on the 72nd hole put an end to the incredible feat. Maybe Tom has one more charge in him during an upcoming major.

Posted here are just a few of the drawings: 
Harry Vardon
Ben Hogan
Byron Nelson

drawing of Byron Nelson by Steven Anthony Salerno

Here is the full list of all the player which will appear in my final "Major Chart" art image once it is completed:

Jack Nicklaus (18)
Tiger Woods (14)
Walter Hagen (11)
Ben Hogan (9)
Gary Player (9)
Tom Watson (8)
Harry Vardon (7)
Bobby Jones (7)
Arnold Palmer (7)
Gene Sarazen (7)
Sam Snead (7)
Nick Faldo (6)
Lee Trevino (6)
J.H.Taylor (5)
James Braid (5)
Seve Ballesteros (5)
Byron Nelson (5)
Peter Thompson (5)
Willie Anderson (4)
Jim Barnes (4)
Raymond Floyd (4)
Bobby Locke (4)
Tom Morris Sr. (4)
Tom Morris Jr. (4)
Willie Park Sr. (4)
Phil Mickelson (4)
Ernie Els (4)

These simple drawings I am doing are fun.... I spent many hours locating all the 27 reference photos I needed, and in some instances I found a photo I wanted which depicted a player in the exact swing pose I wanted, but I had to then find another photo of the player which had a better view of his face and then in my drawing combined the visual reference from the two different photos. Of the very early players on the list, like Tom Morris Sr and Jr, or Willie Anderson, or J.H. Taylor, or Willie Park Sr. it was impossible to locate any decent reference photos, so I was stuck with whatever photo I could find.

Once I have completed the final art for "Majors Chart" and the limited edition art print is available, I will post a notice here on my blog....

To view all my limited edition golf art prints available, visit sasgolf.com

" 9/64" Measurement of a Golfer

visit sasgolf.com to view this golf art print and many others...

"9/64" -the numbers seen within the art print of golfing legend Ben Hogan is not a mysterious measurement nor a mathematical fraction... it is his professional golfing career record: 9 major championships and 64 PGA Tour victories. The most impressive detail of Mr. Hogan's history is he survived a near-fatal automobile accident at age 36 and afterwards went on to win 6 more major championships. (you may have to click on the image above to see the full composition)


This new golf art print from artist Steven Anthony Salerno is now available at sasgolf.com in the "exclusive edition" gallery. The original art was created with crayon, pastel, and gouache on paper with digital wood grain effects. Only 50 of these superbly reproduced golf art prints are available (17"x22" size) in the limited edition. Printed in the artist's studio using brilliant permanent pigment inks on archival 100% cotton rag based fine art papers, visit sasgolf.com to learn more about these limited edition prints. 

Steven Anthony Salerno opens his web golf art gallery

I've been a professional illustrator all my adult life... and have played golf since I was a young boy. I played well enough as a teenager to win the Vermont State Junior Amateur Championship, and as a young man worked in the golf business for several years, first as an Assistant Professional at the Yale University Golf Club, then at Racebrook Country Club, both in Connecticut. During that time I was also a registered apprentice in the PGA, passing their playing ability test (PAT) and also completing the first stage of their business school.

In my illustration career I create images for clients in magazines, advertising, children's picture books, product packaging, etc... However the golf drawings, paintings and graphics I also created over the years were made just for myself, never as an assignment for a commercial client. Very few people knew I even created golf related images.

In 2009 the US Open conducted by the USGA was to be played at the Bethpage Black Course in Farmingdale, Long Island, just a short distance outside of Manhattan (NYC) where I live. The Black Course is a course I've played before, so I decided to create a pretend design of a US Open/Black Course poster just for the fun of it. I created one, then another and another... having such a fun time that in the end I created seven different "mock" poster designs showcasing the Black Course as the 2009 US Open Championship venue. I presented a few of them in February 2009 to the Marketing Director at the USGA, Mary Lopuszynski, but they had already selected an official poster/print for the 2009 US Open event and in fact had already passed the date for finalizing all their merchandise selections.

These test Bethpage Black Course images I created made me decide that I'd pursue another new direction with my artistic talents by joining my life long interest in the game of golf with my artistic talents. Since I continue to work in the illustration field using my name Steven Salerno, I therefore decided that I'd promote my golf art images using my full name Steven Anthony Salerno, just to create a bit of an identity separation between my continuing career in illustration and my budding golf art career. The name of my golf art web site is SASgolf.com -which are my initials, S.A.S.

So, next I tentatively posted these 2009 Bethpage Black Course golf art images onto my illustration blog site, while I figured out how I was going to promote my golf art. In June of 2009 from out of the blue I received a call from Mike McAllister, golf writer and the Managing Editor of the PGA TOUR official web site. He explained that he'd seen my golf art images, and asked if I'd like to create art images of the tour's top players every week in their Player Spotlight feature on pgatour.com. Of course I did! So throughout the rest of 2009, every week, I created portraits of many of the tour stars, including Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Padraig Harrington, Steve Stricker, Camilo Villegas, and others...

This project connection with the PGA TOUR further propelled me to want to make the leap into going beyond my career in illustration and also becoming the best golf artist I can be... so, I created and launched sasgolf.com to display and sell limited edition golf art prints reproduced from my golf art drawings, paintings and graphics.

Visit sasgolf.com to view all the various "galleries" of my prints available to you, for display in your home or office. If you love the game, you'll certainly find a print you'd enjoy owning. These striking prints are printed on 100% cotton rag-based archival fine art papers using vivid permanent pigment inks. The superb inkjet printing process, called Giclee, is the same ultra-fine printing process now used by many museums to produce highly accurate reproduction prints of drawings and paintings in their collection.

Posted above are a couple of my "test" Bethpage Black Course poster designs I initially created.