Meet Becca McCoy and Justin Groom

Today we’d like to introduce you to Becca McCoy and Justin Groom. They and their team shared their story with us below:

When we met, Justin had recently made a life change, poised to return to full-time art after a 20-year hiatus, and Becca was a busy professional stage actor and hobbyist photographer in the midst of a travel year. Our time together was spent traveling and splitting time between Florida, where Justin lived, and Chicago, where Becca lived, with Justin doing a horror convention and creating new works and Becca photographing her travels and performing in musicals. We celebrated our first anniversary – and three weeks later was March 2020…

Many aspects of our lives changed irrevocably, but fatefully, we decided to move in together and to do so outside of Atlanta, into a family-owned home on Leafmore Drive in Smyrna. The house was built by Justin’s grandparents in the early 1960s and was vacant since his Nana’s passing. Although he was raised in Tampa, Justin was born in Cobb County and brought to this house from the hospital.

Along with the house, we became caretakers of the most pathetic Meyer lemon tree you’ve ever seen. “Tree” is generous. It was like a stick shoved into a pot vomited out some twigs and five leaves and called it a day. It lived in the sunroom with the other lusher plants where it expanded its spindly stems. Somehow, those spindly stems sprouted more leaves. And ambitiously, it flowered. And improbably, fruited. All the buds failed… except for one. And that one bud on this ‘Charlie Brown’ lemon tree produced the most beautiful lemon.

In 2022, we formalized Leafmore Studios, LLC, a Smyrna-based fine art creative business. In addition to completing commissions for businesses and individuals, we were vendors in nearly 40 markets, exhibitors in 25 galleries and juried art shows – each winning an award – and selected for a combined 4 public art initiatives, all in our first year.

Our studio mascot is our little Meyer lemon – a bright, cheery symbol of creation and success against the odds.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Launching a small business is always challenging, and launching an arts-based business is very challenging, so doing both simultaneously in an unprecedented pandemic era is extremely challenging. But these last few years have reinforced the importance of pursuing a life well-lived and being guided by personal passion. Whatever challenges come our way are automatically more manageable because we are fueled by a different kind of determination.

Unpredictable weather, limited upstart capital, shipping and supply chain issues, inflation, saturated market, an inequitable internet… the list goes on! But again, the difference in manageability when you are working for yourself, in pursuit of something you believe in, is immeasurable.

The parts of the road that have been smooth are so because of the community we’ve made up here. People like Indie Arts Alliance, Sudnat Studios, and various Arts Alliances (Smyrna, Acworth, South Cobb) have been so welcoming and supportive. We have made wonderful friends and been exposed to invaluable resources and are deeply appreciative of these generous artists.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Justin is an illustrator, regardless of medium. His work is always centered in narrative. His early career success came from an underground indie comic, BIOHAZARD, with issue #1 published in 1990 and from painting nightclubs in Tampa in the mid-90s, among other illustration and graphic design work. When he returned to full-time art about 20 years later, he focused on merchandise design and commissions and has since expanded into public art and book covers. His illustrations have been featured on PEOPLE MAGAZINE INVESTIGATES and the cover of the best-selling novel HUNTERS POINT. He is equally comfortable with digital or hand-drawn execution, whimsy or dystopia. His work is easily identified by distinct line work, with an aesthetic influenced by Moebius, Heavy Metal, Studio Ghibli, and Richard Scarry. Around Atlanta-metro, he is known for his Space Cat works, which began with a digital illustration of his beloved Russian Blue Sasha as a cosmonaut titled “Meowcurry in Retrograde” and has grown into a series of paintings and merchandise items featuring cats in oversized space helmets. In 2022, he won a Merit Award in a South Cobb Arts Alliance juried show for his pen and ink of THE CROW and was one of 10 artists selected by Roswell Arts Fund to paint a utility box for the City of Roswell.

Becca is a multi-disciplinary creator. Until the March 2020 theatre industry shutdown, she’d performed in 60 professional shows nationwide over a 20+-year career. Post-shutdown, her priorities changed, and she pivoted to focusing on photography, a passion of hers since childhood. In 2021, her photographic travelogue THE YEAR OF EXTRAORDINARY TRAVEL was published by St. Petersburg Press and in 2022, it was adapted for stage in a world premiere production at Studio Grand Central in St. Petersburg, Florida. The stage production combined literature and projections and included two gallery exhibits. Becca’s photography is often remarked upon for capturing something compelling about mundane subjects. She was self-taught before the proliferation of digital and as a result, learned to get as much in-camera as possible with minimal need for post-processing and she still shoots that way. In 2022, she won Honorable Mention for 2D Works in the Acworth Arts Alliance juried show for her photograph “Egg-istential Crisis,” and was one of 40 artists selected by Tarpon Arts for the Illuminated Art Box installation.

Leafmore Studios is known for our Illustrated Photos – where Justin hand-illustrates on top of one of Becca’s photographs. The finished product looks like an old-school animation cel and always elevates both of our artistic contributions in a “sum of its parts” way. We are also known for our branding, particularly our Meyer lemon mascot, or “the derpy lemon.” We give out Lemonhead candy from our vendor booth and people remember that from market to market. Plus, we are hyper-local proud Smyrna-based artists, with a Love Smyrna design on merchandise found in our vendor booth as well as area businesses like Vickery Hardware.

We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
Luck – good and bad – plays a huge part in both of our lives and our business. We consider ourselves lucky people, even (maybe especially) when it doesn’t look on the outside like we were lucky. Not too long ago, our truck broke down in the parking lot after packing up from a pop-up market. It had been a long day, we were cold and tired, and it was nearing 1am. Unlucky? Well, no – because we were safely not on the road at the time, AAA got to us right away, the tow truck had a flatbed so all our gear and wares could make it home, and there was room for both of us up front with our driver, and we had great laughs and nice conversation with this new person on the ride home. However you want to define it – faith, luck, attitude of gratitude, yin and yang – we try to always see the good that comes with the bad and consciously acknowledge how much more there is of the former.

Pricing:

• Individual Commissions start at $100
• Business Commissions start at $250
• Murals start at $1,000

Contact Info:

• Website: leafmorestudios.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/leafmorestudios/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/leafmorestudios/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/leafmore-studios/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/leafmorestudios

Image Credits
Photos of Justin Groom and Becca McCoy by Joe Mazza / Brave Lux