The Last Supper of my NBA era

I spent a whole year on this drawing. I'd had the idea for much longer, but I couldn't work on it seriously, so I kept putting it off. At some point the right time came, and then I saw it through.

Why basketball

Basketball has been with me for as long as I can remember. I played for years and I still get on the court now and then. The NBA generation from the early 2000s to about 2020 shaped me like almost nothing else. Those are the players whose games I watched at night and argued about with friends. At some point I wanted to dedicate a picture to them.

Why the Last Supper

Works by famous painters inspire me anyway, da Vinci is just one of them. I wanted something instantly recognisable. Anyone who sees my picture should immediately sense what it refers to, and the Last Supper does that. So: a long table, the figures in groups, each with their own posture. And I wanted to provoke a little.

Who gets the middle

That was the hardest decision. To me personally there is only one greatest, and that's LeBron James. He's the reason I started playing basketball, that's my era. I never experienced Michael Jordan's time at all.

Still, Jordan had to go in the middle, in the place of Jesus. He revolutionised basketball and for most other people he is the most important person in this sport.

LeBron sits next to him as Judas. That's no put-down, quite the opposite. But he's the one who wants the throne, who wants to push Jordan off it, and he has come closest. Putting him there was hard for me and still the only right decision. I actually think it makes the picture more interesting.

On Jordan's other side sits Kobe Bryant. To me the third-best player of this era, and a seat that has carried a different weight since his death.

That's exactly the debate that never stops: who is the best? With my picture the question becomes: why is Jordan in the middle and not LeBron or Kobe?

Choosing the 13 people was hard too. It's no random selection, each of them shaped my years as a fan. But there were many other very good players. In the end I had to decide, and this is my personal choice.

Pure meditation

I drew everything by hand with charcoal pencils on 100 × 60 centimetres, in the gaps. When I had a client, I came to the studio early and drew for two or three hours first. On days off and at weekends I drove to the studio just to draw all day. Added up, that was about 15 full days from 9 am to 6 pm, so around 135 hours.

For me it was pure meditation, and at the same time the biggest drawing challenge I had set myself up to then. It was best when nobody was in the studio and I could put on relaxing music. Totally relaxed and better than any other meditation.

The biggest difference from tattooing: there's no client with their own opinion and their own taste. This picture belongs entirely to me, I can do everything the way I want.

What's hidden in the picture

On the table and in the background there are details that belong to the individual players: small references, quotes, objects.

• Shaquille O'Neal has a lot of money in the Nike box. It stands for the contract he absolutely wanted back then.
• The AND1 sneakers on the right of the table were really popular back then, lots of people wanted them.
• The Hennessy bottle in front of Allen Iverson isn't there by chance either.
• The Louis Vuitton bag is no coincidence either. NBA players are crazy about fashion, and Louis Vuitton is especially popular with them.

Those are just a few of them. If you keep looking, you keep finding something new.

The picture as a print

The drawing is available as a fine art print in three sizes, signed by me.