The Red and Black

Issue date: 3/4/09 Section: Variety

Media Credit: JIM DIFFLY Sophomore Greg Stone drew the NORML picture that caused a stir with Univ. administration. [Click to enlarge]

Andy Warhol once said that "the idea is not to live forever; it is to create something that will." And one University sophomore seems to be living up to that statement pretty quickly.

Thanks to his innate artistic ability and advocacy of marijuana law reform, Greg Stone has created something that will live forever - whether University President Michael Adams likes it or not.

"I'm good friends with John Hill, the guy who founded [UGA NORML]," Stone said. "I just kind of hopped on board."

Stone was given the task of designing a T-shirt logo for NORML using University mascot Hairy Dawg. Stone said that when he revealed the sketch, not everyone was thrilled.

"They all got mad when I had the original Hairy Dawg drawing," Stone said. "The problem [NORML members] had was that he's not doing anything productive. He's just leaning against the Arch, his eyes are glazed over, and he looks baked."

Stone admits that this probably wasn't the best way to represent NORML, and he had no problem reworking it to depict Hairy Dog, still smoking, but this time with a stack of textbooks nearby.

"They're just trying not to make us look like stoners," Stone said.

Stone doesn't just spend all of his time rallying for marijuana reform. He's also illustrating a children's book. The book, which stars an alligator named Pickles, demonstrates the importance of friendship.

"Pickles has this friend who's a turtle, and the turtle loses his favorite bear. Pickles and his other friends try to help him to find something new to replace the bear. In the end, Pickles gives the turtle his own bear out of kindness," Stone said.

"It's a pretty boring story; I'm not going to lie - but it would be cool to have a published work."

Stone used ink and water colors in his illustrations. In addition to being a simple side project, the book is also perhaps the first step for Stone in realizing his childhood dream.

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