Baseball Artist James Fiorentino To Reveal Newest Work At Philly Show

The newest work of James Fiorentino, a renowned baseball artist, will be showcased March 10 when the nation’s oldest trading card show opens in suburban Philadelphia.

Known as The Philly Show, the three-day exposition will be held at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, PA.

At the show, Fiorentino will unveil his ELITE collection, a series of 22 x 30-inch original watercolors signed by both the artist and the athlete he captured on canvas. The work has different themes, including Great Duos, vintage baseball, and even a few triple-signed player pieces.

In addition, the artist will be displaying and selling several of his “There Is Only One” originals – a huge success in the collecting world.

“A lot of my paintings now sell in the five figures,” said Fiorentino at his home studio in Flemington, NJ. “I’ve been painting for 30 years so a lot of people want to own a Fiorentino.

“Even players own my art. I paint for players and have been in many galleries, museums, and sports Halls of Fame. I’ve been lucky and blessed to have so many people commission me to do art and it keeps coming in. To see really big-time collectors seeking out my work is wonderful.”

A true child prodigy, Fiorentino was the youngest artist to have artwork hanging in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

“When I was 14,” he explained, “I met Joe DiMaggio at a card show and had him sign an original of mine. Someone offered me a substantial amount of money back then, around 1992, so I knew I was doing something I had a passion for but could also make money on.”

Much of his baseball work appears on Topps trading cards.

“One of my dreams was to have my art on cards,” he said. “That was a huge goal. Then in 1999, [baseball historian] Marty Appel curated the Topps Gallery Heritage set I did with the artist Bill Purdom. It was only 10 paintings but turned out to be a great set. I was only a junior in college at the time.”

A graduate of Drew University, he spent four years as varsity shortstop for the school, making the all-conference team as a freshman and eventually getting into the Middlesex County Sports Hall of Fame. He even hit a home run at Doubleday Field in Cooperstown when his American Legion team played there.

“I enjoy the game more than other artists because I played it,” he said, “but I knew my life would be more involved on the art side.”

Now 45, he coaches sons Tyler, 13, and Dylan, 9. “They get to see a lot of things most kids don’t,” said Fiorentino, noting that they have met Mike Trout, Albert Pujols, Rickey Henderson, Vladimir Guerrero, Jr. and other stars when they accompanied their dad onto major-league diamonds for presentations of Fiorentino’s baseball art.

Their mom, Jessica, a special education teacher in Hunterdon County, is tolerant of her husband’s work schedule.

“I like to keep this a 9-to-5 job,” he said, and have done that for the last 25 years. It’s hard to say how long it takes me to do one painting. It depends upon how many hours I need. If I’m painting throughout the day, it can take me a week, though it could be a little more or less. It depends upon the size, the detail, and how much is involved.”

Because he’s always working, Fiorentino has reduced his travel schedule. He goes to only a handful of major-league games, usually at Yankee Stadium, but also enjoys the local Somerset Patriots, a Double-A affiliate of the Yankees.

“It’s great to see guys coming up,” he said. “It’s nice to live in an area where we have such a great stadium and great team.”

His card-show schedule is now down to the Philly Show and The National, an enormous collectibles show in Atlantic City. Both are relatively close to home for Fiorentino.

Whenever he can, he journeys up to Cooperstown, more than five hours away by car. “I love the Hall of Fame and used to go there every year,” said the artist, whose work displayed there includes the Induction Day program cover featuring Mike Schmidt, a Roberto Clemente painting in the permanent collection, plus a piece depicting Greatest Negro Leagues Players, which also hung in the Negro Leagues museum in Kansas City.

His best work was painted for the Tampa-based Ted Williams Hitters Museum. “One day, that will be one of the greatest paintings in the hobby,” Fiorentino said. “Ted chose his 20 greatest hitters and did a book on them. That painting hung in Ted’s house before it was moved to the museum. It was signed by Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio, Mike Schmidt, Hank Aaron, Ralph Kiner, Willie Mays, Williams – all players who were there when it was presented to Ted. I had such a great meeting with him prior to going to the event.”

Another Fiorentino favorite is Cal 2131, commemorating the consecutive games played record of Cal Ripken, Jr.

“I think I paint better now than I did when I was younger,” the artist said. “When I went to The National last summer, I looked back at the Ted Williams painting and thought, ‘Man, that’s as good as I can paint.’”

A collector himself, Fiorentino favors older, often-oddball items.

“I have a pretty big collection,” he said. “I collect everything. I love vintage stuff. I’m putting together a 1953 Topps set now and love buying vintage Mantle cards. I really enjoy the older stuff.”

As a Yankees fan, his favorite players once wore pinstripes.

“Being able to meet DiMaggio and Mantle and be around guys like Derek Jeter and Aaron Judge is great,” he said, “but the older Hall of Famers are still the best. I remember talking to Stan Musial, Ralph Kiner, and Ernie Banks. That was something I can never get back.”

He even painted the cover of Dirt in the Skirt, the autobiography of former women’s league standout Pepper Paire-Davis.

“I met her at The National, did several paintings of her, and brought her onto the field at Yankee Stadium, where the players were going crazy.

“We talked about baseball in the ‘40s and ‘50s. She went to high school with Marilyn Monroe when she was Norma Jean Baker and later worked with her in the Howard Hughes aircraft factory. Her life was unbelievable.

“I’ve been lucky to have mentors representing those lost years,” he said.

One of those mentors, Hall of Fame manager Tony La Russa, became a friend through baseball but developed a relationship through a common interest in wildlife. Fiorentino, a trustee of the Raptor Trust of New Jersey, has a passion for hawk-watching and hawk-banding that extends to his easel.

According to the artist, “Tony drove himself out to the Raptor Trust and we let him release a red-tail hawk back into the wild after it was nursed back to health. Some of my opportunities with Tony on the field were tied together with nature, art, and athletes.”

Fiorentino has also painted presidents. In fact, his portrait of George H.W. Bush is hanging in his presidential library. He has met nine presidents plus assorted world leaders, including Mikhail Gorbachev.

“Those were historical people,” he said, “so it was even more amazing than meeting the athletes.”

Most of his current projects are paintings that have been commissioned.

“You want to be working all the time,” he said, “but I do throw things in for myself if I think they can sell very well. For example, an Aaron Judge painting. People have specific things that they want.”

Asked about his personal collection, Forentino admitted he has thinned the herd.

“I got rid of my newer cards but have hundreds of signed baseballs,” said the artist, who obtained most of the signatures at shows, golf outings, or other special events. “It is much more difficult today to get player autographs on original art and older players are often hard to find even if they’re still alive.”

More than a half-dozen sports legends will join Fiorentino at his Philly Show booth next weekend. He will also have other special guests.

“I started meeting players at card shows,” he said. “For example, that’s where I first met Yogi Berra. He saw my work, brought me to his house, and then to his golf tournament, where I met other players. The relationships I have with a lot of these players goes back to when I was a kid.

“It made sense for me to paint something I love, something I could get autographed that was unique and different from everything else people were collecting at the time. So I came up with the idea of having players sign my artwork.”

His models are often old photographs or baseball cards – some from his collection but others from assorted private collections. What makes his art different is his attention to detail, coupled with the life-like Fiorentino style.

“I paint in my own style,” he said. “The nice thing is that sports art is being recognized now for the first time. Paintings on cards are looked at as true pieces of art. It’s a good time to be working in sports.”