THE new Las Vegas headquarters of the premier mixed martial arts organisation in the world is set to feature artwork by a renowned sports painter from Newbridge.

Patrick Killian was in Nevada last weekend to exhibit work and paint scenes from the boxing world middleweight title fight between Gennady Golovkin and Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez on Saturday, but and decided to pay a visit to the home of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).

There, he was granted an audience with UFC president Dana White, and the businessman was so impressed with Mr Killian’s work that, after giving him a guided tour of the premises, he decided to purchase a number of his paintings to display on the walls.

Mr Killian had recently produced several paintings of the eventful build-up and subsequent boxing contest between UFC lightweight champion Conor McGregor and undefeated boxing legend Floyd Mayweather.

Mr White agreed to buy and display three of the paintings, immortalising the fight in UFC history.

Mr Killian said: “To have actually met Dana and for him to not only take an interest in my artwork, but also to buy from me was great. I initially had to wait for about an hour at the headquarters’ huge reception room to meet with him. He’s very busy but he came across as a very nice, down to earth guy.

“He showed me around all the differently named conference rooms like the Muhammed Ali Room and the Conor McGregor Room.

“These rooms had artwork in them by some familiar household names, such as Damien Hirst, who had done some cool Ali pieces.”

After leaving the UFC HQ, Mr Killian made the short trip to the MGM Grand to exhibit his latest works at the final Golovkin versus Alvarez pre-fight press conference, showcasing his paintings to some of the biggest names in world boxing.

Among those to examine Mr Killian’s work were World Boxing Council (WBC) president Mauricio Sulaiman and Telegraph boxing correspondent Gareth A Davies.

Mr Killian, a former amateur boxer himself with over more than 40 senior bouts to his name, produced his first commissioned artwork in 1995, before diverting his full attention to his main passion shortly after.

A little over 20 years on, Mr Killian has since produced works of numerous sporting icons, including Jenson Button, Mike Tyson, Paul Gascoigne, Sugar Ray Leonard, Nigel Mansell, Henry Cooper, Tony Jacklin, ‘Prince’ Naseem Hamed, Jamie Robinson, Shane Warne and Gary Player.

To find out more about Mr Killian’s work, visit his website.