September 8, 2025

Ferris State alum’s creative entrepreneurship finds her painting live wedding scenes

You've heard of wedding photographers. But wedding painters? 

What started as a one-off gig for artist Hallie LeBlanc has grown into Abundance Live Wedding Art, an upstart business venture that's giving couples a uniquely intimate way to preserve the magic and memories of their special day.

“More and more people are looking for something special when it comes to capturing their wedding,” LeBlanc said. “They want something that’s going to set their and their guests’ experience apart.” 

LeBlanc, a graduate of Ferris State University’s Kendall College of Art and Design, launched her business in 2022. She’s not the first—live wedding painting has been having a Tik-Tok-fueled moment recently—but she's set herself apart from the crowd with a highly personalized process.

Since painting happens live during the wedding, LeBlanc has limited time to work. She emphasizes quality over quantity, focusing her energy on a single piece. Her process, on the other hand, starts well before the big day with determining the moment the couple want her to paint. 

“I meet with my clients ahead of time to talk about what their hopes and dreams are for the painting,” she said. “It's a lot of listening and asking about their lives and pulling on little strings that emerge to understand what’s special to them.”

On the day of the wedding, LeBlanc takes photographs of the moment in question, which could be anything from a first look or a pre-ceremony pose on the venue grounds to the exchange of vows or the first kiss. The couple then selects their favorite photo for her to use as a reference.

Then comes a rough sketch of the reference photo, usually made during cocktail hour. The actual painting happens during the reception. LeBlanc sits to the side at her easel, bringing the piece to life as onlooking guests celebrate. In that way, she—and her creativity—become part of the scene.

“They're watching this story unfold of celebrating people they love. Having this artist there painting somebody they watched grow up who is now starting their next chapter, it adds something special to the memory,” she said. “Getting to participate in that makes me feel alive.”

Rather than competing with wedding photography, LeBlanc sees her services as complimentary. 

“Live painting is not meant to capture the entire day in the same way as a professional photographer preserving all the fleeting moments of the wedding, yet we both have the same goal in mind as storytellers,” she said. “I think of my paintings as heirloom works of art that will be passed down for generations.”

LeBlanc is an immensely talented artist. But her strong communication skills and passion for human connection have been just as important to her career. After earning a Master of Fine Arts degree from KCAD in 2014, she found success as a freelancer creating commissioned memorial portraits of clients’ loved ones and pets that were informed by the same kind of in-depth interviews she conducts with her wedding clients. 

Knowing what made her subjects who they were—their mannerisms, their spirit, their passions, the people they loved and the things they cared about—is essential to her work. 

“It's a special kind of trust that folks give me to create the likeness of somebody that they love,” LeBlanc said. “The best skill I have is the ability to offer myself as a listening ear.”

As LeBlanc’s portrait business grew through client referrals, she also started venturing into the world of public art. During the pandemic, a mural project with local nonprofit Lions & Rabbits Center for the Arts expanded her reputation and generated a whole new source of clientele. 

One of those clients, Grand Rapids event venue The Rutledge, hired her to create custom welcome murals for weddings and corporate events on the giant chalkboard wall near the venue’s entrance. 

“I’d do a lot of floral patterns based on the flowers that were going to be used during the wedding or try to match the color palette of the wedding party’s outfits or the overall colors the decorators were using for the space,” LeBlanc said. “I’ve done things like art deco themes and disco ball motifs for corporate clients or hand-drawn versions of logos and brand marks.”

The more she did for The Rutledge, the more familiar LeBlanc became with the local wedding industry. In talking with couples and the wedding planners, coordinators, florists, and other vendors that worked with them, she noticed a consistent desire for highly customized service. 

When one of those couples approached LeBlanc about doing live painting at their wedding, she decided to take a chance and go for it. 

“My first wedding was a real party. It was a great family who was very supportive of the bride and groom, and they were just delighted to see whatever I was doing,” she said. “I learned right away that a big part of my job was to respond to the emotional vibe of the room.”

From there, the clients kept rolling in, and LeBlanc kept honing her approach through each experience. She now offers clients a choice between immediate delivery of the painting the night of the wedding or the option of having her take it back to her studio for a more detailed finish in the style of a traditional oil painting. She even offers packages that include doing simple sketches of wedding guests for them to take home after the reception. 

She’s continued to evolve as a creative entrepreneur as well, building on lessons learned from scaling her commission work and her previous art business Trillium & Twig, where she carved custom designs into lino blocks and printed them on tea towels, aprons, and other textiles she’d sell at local art markets and art fairs. 
“Trillium & Twig taught me so much about how to run a business, and I’m continuing to learn through Abundance about how to manage my time wisely and how to navigate hiring a bookkeeper, handling taxes, and all of the other legal aspects,” Leblanc said. 

In 2023, Abundance Live Wedding Art officially became LeBlanc’s full-time job. For emerging artists looking to start their own business, she has two pieces of advice: don’t be afraid to think outside the box and remember that customer service is just as important as what you’re selling. 

“A lot of my career has been just looking for art jobs in places I didn't imagine traditionally they would be,” she said. “So much of success as a working artist comes from creating a network and nurturing relationships that can grow your opportunities in ways that you can't expect.”

As for what’s next for her growing business, LeBlanc points back to its roots. 

“The name ‘Abundance’ stems from this idea that if you create in abundance, you will meet the right people in abundance; the resources you need will come in abundance; and you will have love in abundance,” she said. “It’s a reflection of my hope for a fearless creativity—not pretending that fear doesn’t exist but refusing to give it power over me.”