Saratoga Springs chalk artist injured in accident in Indonesia

PHOTOGRAPHER: Tatiana Zarnowski

A teen whom many Saratoga Springs residents and visitors know as “the chalk art girl” is recovering in a Singapore hospital after being hurt in a motorbike accident in Bali, Indonesia.

Alexis Broz, 19, who wowed crowds on Broadway sidewalks last summer with her large, colorful chalk drawings, suffered three leg fractures and a cracked pelvis while on a 16-day school trip with SUNY Adirondack, where she is a student in the adventure sports program, said her father, Kenneth Broz.

She was a passenger on a motorbike driven by another student that went off the road Sunday morning, he said.

Alexis’ mother, Amy Broz, took a 22-hour trip to Singapore Tuesday to be with her daughter in Gleneagles Hospital, where Kenneth Broz said his daughter is getting very good treatment after having surgery Monday afternoon.

“It’s been quite an ordeal,” he said, joking: “Obviously she’s doing a lot better, because I see her on Facebook.”

She was transferred from a Bali hospital to Singapore with the help of International SOS, an organization that helps international travelers with emergency medical situations or civil unrest.

Alexis’ classmates are scheduled to come back today, Broz said, but she will have to stay in the hospital for an unknown amount of time, including possibly getting physical therapy there.

She now lives in Glens Falls, but last summer Alexis lived in Schuylerville and rode her bicycle to Saratoga Springs every day with a backpack full of chalk, using Broadway’s sidewalks as her canvas for six to eight hours a day.

Before long, businesses commissioned her to decorate their sidewalks, and like many street buskers, Alexis also put out her hat to collect change from admiring passers-by.

There were many.

“I’ve had people come up to me from other countries and say that they’re my international Facebook fans,” she told The Gazette last summer. “I get random text messages on my phone from people who have picked up my business card and they’ll just say, ‘Thanks for brightening Saratoga.’ It’s just really sweet and it’s fun to just be around in a town where everybody knows you.”

Her colorful, fun drawings included a hound dog smoking a cigar, two cartoon thoroughbreds sharing an intimate spaghetti dinner like in Disney’s famous “Lady and the Tramp” scene and a horse tipping its green hat during “Hats Off to Saratoga” weekend.

Broz is an athlete as well as an artist. She was a champion track and field athlete in high school — as a freshman, she won the Division 2 state championship in the pentathlon, breaking the freshman class state record. The pentathlon combines hurdles, shot put, sprinting, high jump and long jump.

Her father said he believes his active daughter will be back to running, biking and beautifying Saratoga Springs at some point soon, and the difficult part for her will be staying still long enough to recover.

“She pushes everything to the max,” he said.