Mike Hamblin captures Green on canvas

Looking for a vision, an image, an idea to jump out at him, Butte artist Mike Hamblin found it in a couple of handfuls of photographs.

“When I saw the front one,” Hamblin said, pointing to a Bob Green likeness dominant in the painting, “I knew that was the one I wanted.” And so “The Green Machine” went to stroke.

Hamblin, creator of many artworks related to Butte people and places displayed at various venues, painted the piece for the coming Montana Tech boosters auction. Another 500 prints, autographed by Hamblin and Green, the 22-year Montana Tech head football coach, will also be sold to benefit Orediggers athletics.

The Digger Auction is set for Saturday, April 26 at the Montana Tech HPER Complex. The silent auction is to begin at 6 p.m., followed by the live auction at 7:30.

The painting shows Green hunched over, hands probably on his knees, wearing a headset and yelling out to the field from the football sidelines. Orediggers football players celebrating a feat are shown at the top of the work while the team running out onto the field is painted in the lower part. Big Butte, adorned by the “M,” rises in the background.

It is very well done.

“It looks more like me than me,” was Green’s assessment.

Hamblin said he was trying to think of how he wanted to paint the piece while he waited for photographs from Montana Tech athletic director Joe McClafferty for ideas.

“Joe sent 10 or 15 and I quickly put together the ones I knew would work,” the artist said.

He said he began the project right after Christmas and finished it in late February or early March.

“A lot of the time, I didn’t work on it at all,” he said of the time span.

“The Green Machine” is one of two items Hamblin has entered in the auction. The other is a painting of Marcus Daly, Digger Athletic Association official Dick Rule told the small group gathered at the Green painting unveiling held Saturday in the Metals Sports Bar & Grill.

“Mike is a perfectionist,” Green said, telling how when autographing a stack of sprints, Hamblin wanted to toss one out because he didn’t like the way he’d signed it.

Each print will be accompanied by a certificate of authenticity and the first one sold will also be packaged with a football autographed by Green, Rule said.

“Montana Tech prides itself as a place for passion — a place where student athletes, coaches and fans pour their energy into competition,” the certificate reads. “No one embodies that spirit more than Coach Bob Green, who has built the Oredigger tradition with twenty-two years of tireless effort. ‘The Green Machine’ captures this passion, energy and pride of Coach Bob Green and his teams.” The certificate tells, too, that a drawn angel shown on Green’s coat sleeve in the painting is dedicated to Mariah McCarthy, the Butte 14-year-old killed last fall while, when walking home from friends, was run over by a driver who had allegedly been drinking alcohol. The angel was displayed on Orediggers helmets last fall. McCarthy’s father, Leo, is a prominent Montana Tech football booster. The Mariah’s Challenge campaign to rub out underage drinking was launched by McCarthy in the aftermath of the tragedy. The angel was designed by Montana Tech football player Kyle Carter.

“Mariah’s grandfather, Dan, coached at Montana Tech,” Green reminded.

The artworks figure to be the centerpieces of the auction items.

“All we’re trying to do is make some money,” Green said. “Let’s get some people there and bid these up. We don’t want much, just all your money.”