Cheers to a successful 24 Hr Live Painting Fundraiser! Thank you so much to everyone who Donated, Tuned In, and Shared! We really are humbled by your kindness. Loyalty & Love. We need to love harder during these hard times. Give roses to your people, while they are still here! Blazay is excited to channel the positivity from this event into our next mural with For Freedoms in Long Island City, Queens!

If you are just now tuning in, thank you for checking us out! The event was hosted by The 914 Collective and produced by AJK Productions. The event started on 08:30AM on August 30th and ended 24 hrs later; 08:30AM, August 31st.
Just like all good things, this event started with a phone call to the right person. Next thing we knew there was three weeks to prepare. An absolute marathon from start to finish.
We hosted this 24hr Live Painting Fundraiser to raise capital and awareness to put towards Blazay's next mural. We are raising funds for paint, materials, equipment rentals, traveling, permits, etc. Our overall goal is to raise $7,015, During the live stream we humbly raised $3,432.60! All proceeds from apparel sales go directly to painting murals, please check out our shop online!


We built up the wall at 07:30AM, AJ got stung twice by yellow jackets in the process. Those bees had it out or him, one ripped a hole in his new shirt and the other got stuck in his sock... Camera's in place, mic check, cables secured, and Showtime! At 08:30AM we began by getting up the drawing with charcoal and drawing it in. The morning was rad, @champagneyogini guided the viewers through a Sunday morning yoga practice, The 914 Collective hosted a Be Yourself, Do it Yourself conversation with the Bronx Underground's own @thefoxandking_inc.
Our morning of entertainment and movement went perfectly smooth! As for painting... the morning into the early afternoon was the hardest part. Mother Nature's hot summer sun was just cooking up the paint! The time to work the paint was short; I needed to channel hyper focus to keep working the paint before it dried up. With constant troubleshooting along the way; learning how to handle the paint on the surface while planning how to avoid these issues during the next steps to painting the canvas. Every painting decision came down to sizing up the temperature of the wall in relation to how the hot sunlight effected the drying time of the medium, and paint.

The rest of the afternoon went undocumented on my end... I was just having so much fun! The photograph Blazay referenced is of a Yonkers, NY Master of Ceremony Blass 89. The original photograph was captured by Just Jax. 2020 has been a very difficult year, we hosted this event to shine light through the dark clouds. We adapted with the time, and created this moment to give roses. With that said, don't sleep, check out Blass 89!
During the afternoon the mission was to paint the hardest aspects of the portrait. The key details of the face needed to be painted while there was daylight. The best part was while the painting went down, Blass 89 was interviewed with AJ Chiarella for a Be Yourself, Do it Yourself podcast. Afterwards, the moment we were all waiting for! Blass 89 performed a live set in the Shakehouse while Blazay got to groove out and paint.
The summer is ending and the sun faded quick! Once the dusk hour came we painted until the last possible second of daylight while listening to an interview Blazay did with the Brooklyn Knight OG Peter Paid. Check out the conversation on Youtube, So Blazay, or IGTV BlazayNY, After 14hrs of Live Painting the reinforcements arrived! Daniel Bonilla came through with some Mango's and fresh paint brushes. During that time Shakeout and Maintenance held down the live stream playing music and collecting donations.
We painted all night, the crew came out and kicked it socially distance style. We honored all of our crafts over the 24hr event. By the 21st hour of the live stream we were totally smoked but we kept the energy up with great conversations, music, yoga, mindfulness practices! Amazingly enough we finished the painting, and hosted a smooth 24hr live stream. Thank you so much to everyone who came together to make this happen, everyone who Donated, Tuned In, and Shared!
Thank you! 914 Collective, AJK Productions, Peter Paid, ChampagneYogini, For Freedoms, Blass 89, Yonkers Whaddup, Peace & Blessings.

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