Artsy Fart is an art and lifestyle company that creates art for the kid at heart! Try not taking yourself too seriously and don’t be afraid to live life with a little more color.
AF has been involved in 40+ Festivals and Pop Up events including: MOPOP, Renegade Craft Fair at Pitchfork Music Fesitval, Motor City Comic Con, Detroit Comic Con, Electric Forrest, DIY Ferndale, DIYpsilanti, All Things Detroit, Detroit Urban Craft Fair, 89X’s 89 Hr Film Festival, Ferndale Pride, Midtown Getdown, “The Original” Ann Arbor Art Fair, The Hazel Park Art Fair, The Dirty Show and many more. He has also designed merchandise for Pure Detroit's locations in the Fisher Building and Ren Cen Building, The Motor City Comedy Festival 2017-2019, Attack Hunger/ Moose Jaw and 10+ other companies.
Artsy Fart has had great success with close to 4 years experience in official pop-up retail locations at Joy Ride Midtown Detroit as well as The Rustbelt Market in Ferndale. This in addition to numerous successful gallery exhibits in the Detroit area with great reviews from sources like The Detroit News and Fox 2 News.
"Artsy Fart’s style is part loose Peter Max, part 1970s underground comics and part technicolor nightmare." Mike Hodges, The Detroit News
Recent awards include Detroit’s Motor City Match Business Challenge, 89X Homie Award for Best Music Video of the Year, Ford’s Meters Made Beautiful Contest, Best 2d Art DIY Ferndale and Best In Show from Detroit Urban Craft Fair’s Holiday Market.
So who’s the Fart behind Artsy Fart? That’d be this guy, Alan Ledford.
Alan’s a creative jack of all trades. He works within the realms of writing, directing, cinematography, post production as well as various forms of illustration and design. Alan graduated with honors in film production from Grand Valley State University with an emphasis on directing and cinamatography for major motion pictures. At Grand Valley, Alan created two award winning senior thesis productions (Playing With Matches and Health Inspection) as well as worked for the University covering digital media production for sports, events and marketing.
Soon after graduating, he moved across the country to Hollywood, CA to work as a director and cinematographer for Fearless Records with such bands as: Bless The Fall, The Word Alive, Forever The Sickest Kids, The Summer Set and I Prevail. While living he worked a second job in production and media copyright for ZEFR/ Movieclips in Venice, CA.
His personal work has been showcased, with accompanying awards, at both the Detroit Institute of Arts and well as the Grand Rapids Art Museum, to just name a couple. As opportunities presented themselves, Alan took on an internationally recognized directing feat. He created and choreographed the world’s largest single shot senior citizen music video with Michael Bublé's "Feeling Good". This gained YouTube top chart status in over 12 countries and received millions of views collectively (and counting!).
Alan has also had a major hand in the advertising game while working for Doner Advertising in Southfield, MI. He worked for multiple years shooting and editing on 300+ tier 1-3 JCPenney commercials as well as clients like: Chrysler, Fiat, Kelly Blue Book, Eureka and Stanley Steamer.
Over the past few years Alan has been developing and leading Digital Media Productions for Birmingham Public Schools in Birmingham, MI and loving it.
The next step to Artsy Fart coming 2021!
NEW DEMO REEL COMING 2021