Jordan Arnell Evans isn’t afraid to put himself – and his concepts – out there.
Having already designed basketball jerseys for the Sandusky Blue Streaks, the Sandusky-based artist hopes to do something similar for Cedar Point. If he can get a meeting with someone from parent company Six Flags Entertainment Corp., the pitch will be Evans creating custom souvenir jerseys for the amusement park’s most popular roller coasters.
“I think (it’s) a cool idea,” Evans says during a recent phone interview. “Nobody has done that.
“I started creating them, like, yesterday, and I put it out there already just to put it out there, get the people tuned into it,” he adds, referring to
a post on his Facebook page from Dec. 26. “Everybody’s loving it and ready to buy the jerseys already.”
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Courtesy of Jordan EvansSandusky Blue Streak Dale Johnson dons one of Jordan's Streakball jerseys.Evans, 34, is the man behind
Art Jordan Design Studios, having formerly operated as the brand Eztaughtme. Born and raised in Sandusky, he returned to the city a few months ago after about a decade in the Cleveland area and a much shorter stint in Atlanta.
It was in Sandusky that, at age 3, he started taking to drawing, sketching on the pads of yellow paper his parents and grandparents handed to him.
“That’s kind of where everything started – from drawing on those papers to getting in contests when I was in kindergarten,” he says.
(According to
his Art Jordan bio, winning that contest earned him a meal with the fire department.)
“I would say around, like, first grade (is) when I kind of noticed I was different – just because people would stand around me and watch me draw,” Evans says. “And I’m like, ‘This is normal to me.’”
After graduating from Sandusky High School in 2008, he spent a year at The School of Advertising Art – now The Modern College of Design – in Kettering, where he could have learned more about creating campaigns and how to be business-savvy, but “I wasn’t good at it,” he says.
As the years went by, he created a logo for a relative’s business – he charged all of $40 – and made the promotional materials for a music group in which he was involved.
He also started to do fan art of hip-hop artists and NBA players, grabbing the attention of folks such as Cleveland native Machine Gun Kelly, aka MGK, and another rapper, Cyhi the Prynce – who showed a piece he did of Kanye West to the music star – and then-Cavaliers star Kyrie Irving.
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Courtesy of Jordan EvansOne of Jordan's Cedar Point jersey designs for the RaptorIn fact, on his first day working remotely on his first job as a graphic designer, Evans says, Irving reached out to him about buying some of his work, which led to that being his only day on the job.
“It was just about going with the faith and (believing) this is the opening to something new.”
He says it was “surreal” when his art of folks including MGK and West got shoutouts from the musical artists themselves.
“It was like, ‘Mom, I just got 1,000 followers!’ ‘Mom, I just got 5,000 followers!’” he says. “It was so unreal.”
He says, though, that he really didn’t “sit in the moment” when that was happening, and it’s something he’s learned to do when it comes to accomplishments such as designing the jerseys for his alma mater’s basketball team.
His portfolio also includes work for
the NBA All-Star festivities in Cleveland in 2022, Sandusky business
Pizza Boys and
ESPN’s “College Gameday.”
His work in the hoops world includes the
LeBron James/“All Eyes on Me” T-shirt you can see
him wearing next to then-ESPN personality Max Kellerman.
Not long ago, Art Jordan opened a space downtown, at 236 Wayne St., where folks can check out his work in person.
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Courtesy of Jordan EvansIn April, Jordan released the largely autobiographical book “Hoggie’s World” about a kid gifted at creating art who wants to turn that into a career down the line.And on his birthday in April, he put out the largely autobiographical book
“Hoggie’s World” about a kid gifted at creating art who wants to turn that into a career down the line.
You guessed it – “Hoggie” was his nickname when he was younger.
“I was a chubby kid growing up,” Evans says. “I always liked eating, so whenever one of my family members cooked and I was there, it was pretty much like, ‘You don't gotta ask him what he want – he’s gonna eat whatever’s on the plate.’”
(He hated the moniker back then, he says, but now it’s something that brings with it good memories.)
His aim with the book is to inspire anyone with gifts at a young age to be purposeful with them, but it goes beyond that.
“The book is mainly for … anybody from the age of 7 and up,” Evans says. “It could be for an adult, as well, because it’s a lot of life lessons where they can learn to be a mentor.
“I got my parents in there, as well, as characters, where they show early support and actually have me come up with a game plan.”
The game plan for Evans – who says he thinks he doesn’t yet have a distinct style but is going for “clean-urban” – is to continue to put his ideas out into the world, such as the recently dreamed-up “Dream More” campaign, which would see murals with that message installed around the area.
“
I put a concept out today, and I got a huge reaction,” he says. “It’s not solidified yet, but a major institution just hit me up – like, probably an hour or two before you called – and asked to partner up on it, so hopefully that goes through.”
Post something on social media and see what happens – a seemingly winning formula for him.
“I’m not afraid to put stuff out there and get the ball rolling just to get a reaction because you never know these days – anybody can see it,” he says. “I don’t like holding onto stuff because I come up with new stuff every day.”