L’Art du Pain Neuf

The art you see on the website has an interesting story.  A story that came from an unlikely source.  Our family had become good friends with great people—Michelle and Maurice.  Graduate school brought them to Bowling Green and she worked in the same department as my wife.  After graduation, they left Northwest Ohio to pursue careers in Minnesota.  We kept in touch with regular phone calls. 

One year, after having left Northwest Ohio, there was a need to return to Bowling Green, Ohio; the entire family was visiting for three days.  It was an understatement to say we were looking forward to visiting with friends again.  “You can stay with us, it’s no problem,” we told them as they discussed logistics for the upcoming visit.

The day came for Michelle, Maurice, and their family to visit.  We enjoyed good food and conversation throughout the weekend.  We caught up about what was happening in our lives.  I talked about the efforts in getting Pain Neuf off the ground and Maurice shared that he was pursuing work in which he could use his talent as an artist.  And as the cliché goes, all good things must come to end; the weekend went by too fast, and Michelle, Maurice, and their family were back in Minnesota.

About a month later, an unexpected thing happened—I received a sketch for the bakery!  It was a good sketch with my likeness with the statement, “It’s so good, it should be sinful”.  I was grateful that Maurice spent the time to make a drawing and send it to me, and I saw that he had good talent.  Furthermore, after evaluating the sketch, I noticed that it had real potential! 

As time went on, I thought more about his sketch and the potential to use more art for the website.  I claim no artistic ability on my own part, so I knew I needed help.  Several months after receiving the sketch, I reached out to Maurice to generate a logo for the website.  He agreed, and the art that you see for Pain Neuf was generated by Maurice.  It’s great, isn’t it?