Described as The Bucket List meets Chocolat! and Sideways! A must see for Baby Boomers, Chocolate Lovers, Alternative Medicine supporters, Right-to-die supporters and many more! Enjoy a leisurely divine journey. A thought provoking, compelling, witty story that has echoed through the ages: what to do when you are nearing your final earthly port!
In November of 2007, I received an e-mail from the Executive Producer and Writer of an upcoming movie entitled "Death, Taxes...and Chocolate!" In her message, Andrea Levinson asked, "I am decorating a scene in a man's diningroom and I want to feature some bodypainting. I love your butterfly woman. Would you give me permission to hang it on the wall in the photo?" I was thrilled to have my work shown in this full length feature film and it turned out that she ended up using three of my bodypaintings and also three bodypainting images from body artist Naomi Smith.
Here is a shot of the dining room before and then two shots of the dining room as it appeared in the film with the bodypainting images hung on the wall. Scroll down farther to see the magazine article that shows all of the pictures that were used.
You can also catch a few brief glimses of the bodypaitnings on the walls of the dining room scenes in the film trailer.
This film received four awards including the 2008 New York International Independent Film & Video Festival Best Ensemble Cast Award for a Feature Film and at the L.A. Festival it won Genre Award Best Feature Film (Comedy), Grand Jury Prize Best Original Screenplay (Andrea Levinson and
Bud Dowdey), and Feature Film Award for Best Supporting Actress (Catherine Trail). Not bad at all for Andrea's first film project.
Naomi Smith wrote the following article for the March 2008 issue of Brush Strokes Magazine (Issue 5)
Death, Chocolates, Taxes and Body Art
Written by Naomi Smith
Upcoming movie "Death, Chocolate and Taxes" is to feature body art by Naomi Smith and Mark Greenawalt. Here Naomi tells us how it happened.
It was late in the fall of 2007 when I got an email from a friend with a referral to a movie producer looking for black and white body art. I had just painted my “Annie Phobie Young” (amphibian in photo below) so I thought, “why not submit it?”
Naomi’s “Annie Phobie Young”
Months went by and I forgot about it since I didn’t hear anything except that the producer was going on vacation and would go over emails when she got back. I didn’t think much of it at all, in fact, I forgot all about it until several months later, I got an email from the producer and not only did she want to use my “Annie”, but wanted to see more of my work to consider for the movie. In my conversation with her, I came to find out a little about the movie and that Mark Greenwalt’s work was also going to be used. I was flattered to have my work along side such a talented artist who has really made a name for himself and has been published more than any other body artist that I know.
Mark Greenawalt’s black & white contributions to the movie.
The movie is called Death, Chocolate and Taxes and is an interesting story about a group of people who decide that, since they have chosen how to live their lives, they also want to choose how they are going to die. Andrea Stern, the producer wrote the story from her own life experiences. There is a pivitol dining room scene where they wanted large framed bodypainting images to be hanging on the wall. I worked closely with the producer and submitted several images. She ended up using three of my prints and three of Mark’s.
L: Naomi´s peacock and R: Mark´s butterfly.
This was not the first time our artwork ended up next to each other, as Mark pointed out, we also were right next to each other in the second issue of Illusion Magazine. Funny coincidences, since he is in Arizona and I am in Washington State about 1500 miles apart. I actually have only met him once in person in Orlando 2006 very briefly. I have had the pleasure of having conversations with Mark Greenwalt over this project and I have to say, he not only is an extremely nice and talented person but he is a wealth of information and very business savvy.
Naomi's Snow Leopard In the Snow
He will be teaching at the UK Face and Body Painting Convention this year and I highly recommend his class. Mark has an extremely impressive portfolio at http://www.futureclassx.com where you can see a timeline of his work, the many places he has been published and some of the painting he did at the Playboy Mansion. Set aside from body painting, he has also written a top country song that soared on the charts and is a lighting designer by day.
Naomi’s Chocolate-Dipped Strawberry.
For me personally, the movie started a series of co-incidences one being that Karen Reinholt and I were commissioned to paint a live chocolate strawberry for our local Chocolate Festival . We liked the design so well, we decided to do studio shoot of the concept. Godiva Chocolates hired our model, whilst painted as a strawberry, to do a presentation of chocolate dipped strawberries. I am liking what chocolate and body art has brought to my body painting world and have found that body art can be “like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get”.
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Unless noted otherwise, Photography and Artwork by Mark Greenawalt c2008. All rights reserved.
