Follow your bliss. It’s been said time and time again. This artist didn’t need to hear it, he simply did it. And the payoff has been pretty outstanding!

Willard Wigan never meant for his art to become a business.

In fact, he never really set out to be an artist; the vocation found him as he was hiding from the real world at 5 years old.

Now 53, Mr. Wigan is renowned for his “micro-sculptures,” ultra-miniature works in a rare genre he helped create. He makes the minutest of statuettes, fitting them in a needle’s eye or fixing them atop a pin head. He carves figures into matchsticks and puts lipstick and clothes on dead houseflies. In short, he takes life-size ideas and characters and shrinks them to a “molecular level.”

These uniquely small works, a sampling of which is currently on display at the Atlanta Art Gallery in Buckhead, fetch high-profile buyers at big prices. During an interview in February, Mr. Wigan said he was working on a commissioned sculpture that would bring seven-foot-tall basketball star Shaquille O’Neal down to nano size.

England’s Prince Charles, musician Elton John, boxer Mike Tyson and “American Idol” judge Simon Cowell all own pieces of Mr. Wigan’s work, which range in price from $35,000 to upwards of $100,000. David Lloyd, the former British tennis player, owns 72 pieces, almost half of Mr. Wigan’s total output of about 200.

Though his work has made him a millionaire, Mr. Wigan doesn’t do it for the money.

“If I wasn’t going to get paid for it, I’d still do it,” he said. “It’s like telling someone who plays basketball they won’t get paid. They’ll still do it. You do what you love.”

Source: GlobalAtlanta