---------------------------------------------------------------------Published June 24, 2005

EX- BOXERS ART APPRECIATED....
by Jennie Dennett/Westmorland Gazette

It might be a long way from the Slade and lack its own arts centre, but Dalton-in-Furness has another acclaimed artist for the town's alumni.

For following in the footsteps of 18th century painter George Romney and the Turner Prize winner Keith Tyson comes Richard Slone.

Mr Slone, a former Dowdales School pupil, is currently being feted as one of America's best sports painters and has been the official artist for the International Boxing Hall of Fame for the last seven years.

The 31-year-old's work hangs on the walls of, among others, Donald Trump, Pamela Anderson, Hugh Hefner and Muhammad Ali. Beneath his golden brush at the moment is a huge, commissioned portrait of the multi-platinum-selling rapper Eminem, posturing with his tattoos exposed, giving what Mr Slone describes as an "enigmatic squint".

It is quite a resume for a boxing protg who left Dalton not on any art scholarship but as a skinny 16-year-old under contract to boxing great Smokin' Joe Frazier.

Mr Slone is well known in the States but has come back into the Limey limelight after he was specially commissioned to do a portrait of Kostya Tszyu and Ricky Hatton, who met in Manchester for the light-welterweight championship (Hatton won). The 50 prints produced of his feel-the-punches portrait were a sell-out.

After going Stateside without his parents, Mr Slone lived in the toughest part of Philadelphia and toured around taking part in exhibition fights.

It was all a far cry from his Dalton life, split between school and trips to the Barrow Amateur Boxing Club.

"I was on the rugby team to let my aggression out, otherwise I was a quiet guy," said Mr Slone, speaking from his Detroit home, betraying only the slightest hint of Barrovian amid his now American vowels.

"Boxing's different. That's sport but I never got into fights, even when I was a bouncer in Barrow at Libertys Under-18s nights. The kids there were crazy!

"I was always independent, I had my own mind. I remember telling this career guidance person I was going to be a fighter and she just laughed and said get real'.

But reality did take him to the USA to be that fighter where he said he was "too focused on boxing" to really feel homesick. "When I look at kids now at 16, some of them are so scrawny, I'm like how did I leave my country at 16 with one bag'? But when you have a dream, it's easy to follow. My parents were very supportive, they were the ones that kept reassuring me, saying you're only a phone call away'."

During his seven years fighting for Frazier, Slone painted in the evenings between training and also developed an interest in the business side of boxing.

He went on to help manage and train, among others, Prince Naseem, Vicious' Vivian Harris and Lennox Lewis - from 1998 until the end of his career.

He even taught Eminem a few moves, a man he describes as "a down to earth guy" fiercely protective of his daughter.

Alongside his career as a boxing manager, Mr Slone became known for his ringside sketches and people in the boxing world began requesting his art as well as his sporting savvy.

He did drawings for Lennox Lewis fight programmes and his paintings featured on the cover of boxing bible Ring Magazine and KO Magazine.

Now Mr Slone has both a successful art and boxing career under his belt, working as vice-president of Detroit-based Kronk Gym beside Emanuel Steward. He has never seen a contradiction between his work in the ring, pasting others with his fists, and the gentle pastime of painting.

"It's funny, a lot of people ask that but to me they went hand in hand. Because I was a natural at both, it never seemed strange."

l ABOVE: Richard Slone with rap star Eminem.

8:36am Friday 24th June 2005 By Jennie Dennett