{"id":547453,"date":"2025-07-22T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=547453"},"modified":"2025-07-22T12:27:32","modified_gmt":"2025-07-22T12:27:32","slug":"usag-benelux-spotlight-edward-lopez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=547453","title":{"rendered":"USAG Benelux Spotlight: Edward Lopez"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n Spc. Edward Lopez displays his collection of war game figures hand-painted by himself in his free time in Brunssum, the Netherlands, May 29, 2025. His extracurricular activities outside of his day job as a military police for USAG Benelux include sketching animation characters, painting war game figures, participating in role-playing games, and more.
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[Editor\u2019s Note: In this series, we are shining a light on our workforce in and around the Benelux. This Spotlight is on Spc. Edward Lopez, a patrol unit Military Police with U.S. Army Garrison Benelux in Brunssum, who pursues a variety of artistic endeavors during his time off work and shares his talent with others.]<\/em><\/p>\n

BRUNSSUM, Netherlands \u2013 With magnifying lenses over his eyes and a tiny paint brush in hand, Spc. Edward Lopez painstakingly completes the colorful detail of his latest war game figure. Applying his artistic skills in miniature painting is not the only avenue for his creativity outside of work. When not painting, he could be found sketching characters, creating artistic works to accompany games, or designing pieces for colleagues.<\/p>\n

\u201cI go through cycles with hobbies. I\u2019ll do [one] for a couple months at a time,\u201d said Lopez explaining how he hyper-focuses for a period then he sets the project aside and moves onto something different.<\/p>\n

During his duty day at the Brunssum Military Police station, Lopez goes about the routine business of active patrolling and security checks. While work typically remains in the ordinary, Lopez\u2019s hobbies add color and variety after hours. His exposure to art of all kinds began as a child with his parents who coincidentally met in a college art class. They always encouraged creative exploration in the home and readily offered art supplies.<\/p>\n

While his mom was a graphic designer and dabbled in mosaic glass and welding, his dad primarily sketched his favorite subjects. Lopez found his current passion in miniature painting of war game figures. He then marks the base of each figure with the name of one of his coworkers. His wife of nearly two years has joined in his hobbies and enjoyed learning the war game. In turn, she has shared her favorites\u2014journaling and scrapbooking\u2014with him.<\/p>\n

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\n Spc. Edward Lopez demonstrates how he paints his war game figures in fine detail with his headband magnifying glasses in Brunssum, the Netherlands, June 10, 2025. Outside of his day job as a military police for USAG Benelux, Lopez pursues creativity and community through drawing, participating in war and role-playing games, and more.
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At times, Lopez finds artistic inspiration with characters from podcast audio dramas that he listens to. As the narrative unfolds, he begins to create a visual character to go along with the storyline.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s nice to have a face to the name even if it\u2019s a cartoon,\u201d he said, as he scrolled through his artwork on his tablet. He went on to explain the pivotal role animation played in his childhood and how it has manifested in his endeavors.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnimation has influenced me a lot growing up and it still does. Some of my favorite movies are still cartoons,\u201d said Lopez. \u201cI prefer stories that are not \u2026 rooted in reality. Some people are very much the opposite.\u201d<\/p>\n

Someday he hopes to attend an art and design college to further hone his skills and to help materialize one of his dreams of making an animated version of the live-action movie The Princess Bride.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s already the perfect movie, but it could be even better if it was animated, because you can exaggerate things,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen you take that peek behind the curtain of animation, it\u2019s very enlightening.\u201d<\/p>\n

Participating in the role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons for more than ten years has also utilized his talent as he creates map designs for the game. When inspired, he revisits a comic that he wrote as a teen to continue to develop the characters and story line. Lopez has also offered his artwork for a T-shirt design and as a gift for a departing colleague.<\/p>\n

This summer, Lopez plans to join the month-long online Art Fight event, a platform developed in 2007, that provides a way to celebrate art in a competitive way. The previous year\u2019s competition brought more than 400,000 participants to the game. Though the interaction offers a fun way to share art, the ultimate goal is to appreciate talent and creativity across the event.<\/p>\n

Read past Spotlight articles from the USAG Benelux:<\/em><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Craig Gronlund<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Erica Nowells<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Dan O\u2019Riley<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Nicolaas de Jager<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Cody Butler<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Danny Janssen<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Sgt. Taylor Smith<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Roel Laugs<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Chris Bridges<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: David Pavey<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Benoit Versieux<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Staff Sgt. Nicholas Cravens<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Mark Fricke<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Staff Sgt. Nicholas Klein<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: C\u00e9dric Reygaerts<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Jacqueline Sangen<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Marilyn Brulez<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Alex Rivera<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Patrick Fowler<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Josh Alo<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Nicolas Delmoiti\u00e9<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Michel De Clercq<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Spc. Shamar Cerant<\/a><\/p>\n

USAG Benelux Spotlight: Jan Grolleman<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spc. Edward Lopez displays his collection of war game figures hand-painted by himself in his free time in Brunssum, the Netherlands, May 29, 2025. His extracurricular activities outside of his day job as a military police for USAG Benelux include sketching animation characters, painting war game figures, participating in role-playing games, and more. (Photo Credit: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":547455,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-547453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=547453"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547453\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":547458,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547453\/revisions\/547458"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/547455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=547453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=547453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=547453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}