It's a late-season art show someplace in Wisconsin in 1982. Jane and Wally had a good show with plenty of sales but it's a long day at the show and time to back the ol' '73 Dodge Sportsman van up to 'the spot' and pack things up. Paintings go face to face (with cardboard between) and back to back, never back to front. The display boards fold up and everything fits nice and tidy in the back of the van. Once packed up it's time to find a nice restaurant for a beer and brandy alexander. The next show is either at Brookfield Square, West Towne Mall or The Forum at the Coliseum Thanksgiving weekend.

That's the backstory - and it's 100% true.

The model - I've been searching for this kit for a long time, and a friend of mine spotted one at a club meeting and got it for me (thanks Brandon).

The MPC Dodge Sportsman window van is a really nice kit and has little to no build issues - this is a kit that would be cool to see come back, but am told the molds were altered long ago.

The build: I had the bronze metallic mixed up in rattle can. It took 5 coats to get just the right flavor of the color I wanted. I omitted the bench seats as the van was also equipped with a wheelchair lift and cargo space for artwork and display stands. I robbed an AMT Ford Van of it's spare tire carrier and cover. I fabbed up some crude looking hand controls and gear shift for the steering column. A 3d trailer hitch from Few Sprues Loose was added to the rear bumper.

The paintings are photographs my dad took of mom's paintings back in the day that were often used to send to art shows that required artists to submit photographic samples of their art to get accepted into the show (art shows, not craft shows back then - those were separate affairs). I took dad's photos, scanned them, reduced the size, printed them on photo paper and mounted them on plastic sheet to give them some bulk.
The display stands and boards are plastic sheet with the pegboard being a decal I made (I wasn't about to drill thousands of tiny holes!). The wheelchair lift is made out of scrap plastic and etched metal, it's purely a hazy-image of the real one (boy, that sure rattled). The Bucky Badger on the spare tire is a home printed decal as are the Wally-centeric bumperstickers "Ask me about my grandchildren." "Say yah! to the UP, eh!" and 2 radio station stickers from where I worked - a current for '82 WMKC and a late '70's station Q106.

I can tell you that I had a heckofatime applying the Bare Metal Foil on the wheel arches.. and eventually said "this is as good as it gets." 'nuff said on that.

Here's The Art Show Van - seen with some bug splatter, some wear and dirt. Sidebar: I was going to dull the paint as this van never had a shine in the 12 years they had it.. but the paint turned out too nice to dull, so this might be a "how it could have looked if we had actually waxed it."

Thanks for looking!

Tim

This shot made me realize I forgot to paint the rear corner lamps and add the 2 lift buttons

Something different for me - I flocked the floor. Here I added wheelchair wear tracks and dirt at the driver floor. I added hand controls and a shifter (not on yet in this view).p>

Interior stuff

The display stands and paintings

One of the few photos that I have of the van. It appears in bits in pieces in other photos but nothing helpful. Lots of sibling memories were tapped to confirm my recollections.
This was a fun build.