Ridgefield woman’s art grabbing the attention of some Portland Trail Blazers players

RIDGEFIELD, Wash. (KPTV) - A local artist with an eye for basketball is grabbing the attention of some of the Portland Trail Blazers.

For Abby Ickert, ball and art is life.

“I started it to, at first, get close to my brothers and have something to relate to them on. The more you practice things, the different outcomes you are going to have,” she said. “None of my art is nature driven, it’s all pretty wild and abstract and unnatural with colors.”

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The class of 2016 alum from Seton Catholic College Preparatory went on to pick up an illustration degree from George Fox University.

“I think I had the natural connection or the draw to draw,” Ickert said.

Ickert’s sports art is a win-win.

“There have been a couple of people in my life who have always supported me and always said, ‘Do what you love and use the gifts God gave you and just see where it takes you,’” she said.

No greater escape to create then her mom’s basement in Ridgefield.

“My favorite part about drawing or painting has always been the eyes,” she said. “That saying, ‘the eyes are the window to the soul’, I think that is so true.”

Ickert’s social channels at Ambition Artistry have stopped the scrolls of some shooting stars in Rip City.

“I have probably done 20 portraits of Dame, it’s ridiculous! This basketball was the first basketball I ever painted,” said Ickert.

After some gift time with Dame Time, Blazers’ teammate Trendon Watford commissioned an eye-popping piece.

“I told him, ‘you know, I can do a custom for you,’ and he said, ‘I am going to need that. I’m gonna need a big one! I have been seeing your art for a while. It’s really cool,’” she said.

Her art is sketched in sharpie, shaded in acrylic and splashed with neon.

“I never thought that I could be an artist when I was little. The whole, ‘starving artist, don’t be an artist, honey. You should be a nurse or whatever, do something that makes you money,’ but it’s like, it’s cool, it’s rewarding that after the time and the passion put into what I do, that people actually want it,” Ickert said. “I don’t know that that will ever stop surprising me. Pinch me, I’m dreaming.”

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Dreaming and creating some fine slam dunk works of art.

“Making art for people that is really meaningful for them, like, really hits home for them, there is no price I can put on that,” she said.

To view more of Ickert’s art, click here.

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