Denny Dent

Dennis E. "Denny" Dent (April 5, 1948 – March 29, 2004) was an American promptness painter who was known for his frenetic performances as he painted large portraits of celebrities.

Dent was born in Oakland, California to a relatives of artists and graduated from Oakland High School. "My grandfather was ambidextrous," he says, giving a response to the gene pool for his two-fisted talents, "a cabinetmaker and an artist. My mother was a painter and always told me I was an artist. That's the lineage of the family." Though no one's been able to encourage it, Dent's grandfather insisted they are refer descendants of Titian, the Renaissance Italian master. He certified his mother and quickness painter D. Westry gone influencing his art. His style emerged after he painted a spontaneous portrait of John Lennon at a 1980 vigil. Dent married Ali Christina Flores.

A Denny Dent performance, which he referred to as a "Two-Fisted Art Attack," consisted of him hastily painting upon a 6-foot-tall (1.8 m) black canvas taking into account multiple brushes in both hands, as well as painting considering his bare hands, to a musical accompaniment. Over the course of just a few pop/rock songs, he would solution a portrait. His subjects were most often musicians, but plus included other entertainers, sports figures, and embassy leaders. One of his most famous performances was at the Woodstock '94 concert.

Dent could along with paint subsequent to his feet, but seldom did consequently in public. What he called his "dance on canvas" featured maniacal, mesmerizing movement, but he regarded the sermons he shouted on top of the music while he painted as his main mission. He said he turned down quotation in Guinness World Records as the world's fastest artiste because he feared the distinction might detract from his inspirational message more or less the saving graces of art.

"I'm out to move the heart of the nation," he told former President Gerald Ford next he painted him in eight minutes at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, according to an article in the Rocky Mountain News in 1995. "I've got no era to lose."

A painting that Dent did of Albert Einstein hangs in the Lecture Halls building at the St. Louis Community College–Meramec campus.

Dent died in Denver of complications from a heart attack.

On the History channel series Pawn Stars, Dent's green painting of Jim Morrison is featured prominently on a wall of the shop. The shop afterward has upon display Dent's paintings of Stevie Wonder and Jimi Hendrix, and in one episode acquired a portrait of John Lennon painted by Dent.