CINCINNATI — Watching back coverage of the AFC Championship Game, Sadie Stuart said she was struck with inspiration. There was something about quarterback Joe Burrow. Not just on the field, but the way he carried himself on his way into the game.

What You Need To Know

  • Sadie Stuart painted a portrait of Burrow in celebration of the Bengals AFC Championship win

  • The portrait went viral on Instagram, inspiring the artist to open a charity raffle

  • The raffle has raised more than $1,600

  • The proceeds go to Joe Burrow’s Hunger Relief Fund

Riding high on the Bengals win, she painted and as soon as she finished, Stuart said she knew she had something special.

“It’s the glasses with the AirPods, with the necklace,” she said. “This was just such a look, I was just like I have to paint this, this is going to be an amazing painting.”

When Stuart posted the finished product to Instagram on Saturday, she found a larger than average audience eager to agree. 

“Just my followers alone were like, ‘How much is this? Are you gonna sell this? This is crazy!’” She said. “From there, then it got on a few explore pages and just blew up.”

Stuart said that’s when her friend, Ricky Lyons, approached her with an idea. 

“We’ve always talked about getting into something fundraising involved and it was just like a perfect scenario,” he said. 

Both hail from the same town in central Kentucky, so when they learned about Burrow’s Hunger Relief Fund, dedicated to serving his native Athens, another part of Appalachia, it felt like fate. 

“It’s all relatable to where we come from so, it was relevant to us,” Lyons said.

They decided to set up a raffle. For every $5 fans donated to the relief fund, they’d get one entry in an upcoming drawing to give away the painting.

By Wednesday evening, they raised more than $1,600. 

“People have been so generous, we’re hoping to get it out there even more,” Stuart said. “The outpouring of love has been insane.”

Lyons said it’s made a beautiful work of art even more powerful.

“It’s not just the confident star football player. You know when I look at this painting, forever I’ll remember that it contributed to something much greater than a painting.”

The two will continue to collect donations until midnight Saturday. Then they’ll do on the drawing the day of the Super Bowl.

According to the Foundation for Appalachian Ohio, the beneficiary of Burrow’s Hunger Relief Fund, Lyons and Stuart are far from the only people the team inspired to give back. Since Burrow initially highlighted the region's poverty in his 2019 Heisman acceptance speech, the foundation’s logged more than $1.3 million in donations. 

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