Mural Painting - A Nontraditional Approach

Remember to click on images to enlarge.
The finished mural...tape is off but dropcloths still in place.

The beginning! Loose sketch in chalk done with use of opaque projector.  See the string?  It's to help with perspective/vanishing point/s.  Never use graphite pencil or pastels containing oils.  These will bleed through acrylics and cause nightmares!

After painting many "small" murals where there is some flexibility of design, I've settled into a process that is comfortable and flexible.  (To me, small is less than 12' X 12').  Granted, there are times when one must reproduce an approved design exactly, but often the submitted mock-ups or proposals cannot render fine detail beyond overall design and color palette.

Larger view with garden bench on left as per proposed design.

This mural was to be a landscape with a "step-into" effect (trompe l'oeil) utilizing an archway with columns as the framework.  The clients desired a soft Impressionist style with dogwoods, rolling hills beyond a garden and a winding pathway. 

 

Where'd that bench go? 

This photo skips ahead quite a lot as I experienced camera focus failure - a horrible malady that gets you when you delay examining photos stored in your camera until it is too late.  The background is blocked in as is much of the middle ground.  You can see the painter's tape employed for straight edges.  You can also see that the bench has disappeared.  The painting was getting too busy on the left and with the overlapping details to come, it would have been obscured.

The bench returns as a ghostly outline...

Yes, the "stone" block floor is part of the mural.  The client's furniture would be covering much of it, so details were "raised" by using this effect.  The picture taped up center was to remind me to keep my hues from becoming too intense.  I use dozens of references as I paint!!  But in final stages, all are put away to allow personal style to come through (one hopes!).

Columns are underway and more details of background and foreground blocked in.

Notice how the bench seems to float without its shadow.

Background trees have been refined and foreground detail added.

Much work to do yet on the columns, stone floor and shadows, but more refinement here of the large Mimosa tree, rhododendron and finally - dogwood branches in foreground.

A large Forsythia was added to make the bench more inviting.

The finished mural!  - From the other entrance to the room.

Play of light and shadow on floor and pathway added.  Columns are shaded and detailed and archway color redefined.Rhododendron is enlarged and cast shadows painted in. 

Mixed Media for March

Six Black Birds  30 x 20 x 3

Working on new pieces for myself and the shop.  This is part of my altar series in that the "frames" were originally designed for pieces based upon Mexican and Spanish altar pieces.  They've morphed into what you see here and below - though they still feel altar-ish to me.  I've got this thing for grapevine tendrils.  I'm sure it's related to my fascination with spirals Equiangular/Spirals (a posting of a couple years back.)  But it's also due to their nature if you will.  As a sometimes basket maker and fiber artist, I've great familiarity with the tensile strength and spring-back qualities of grape tendrils even after being stored for years.

A Singular Path (sold)

And they just make such interesting lines.  It's as if they are drawings in the air that take shape and form; no two alike. I've included a couple of others in the series:  A Singular Path and So Fragile A Fire - both done in the last two years in between bouts of painting. Another previously posted The Madonna of Our Season was done as a holiday mystery give-away purely for fun.

I built the original frame, then asked a woodworker friend to use it as the model for 20 more.  I've four or five left and the next one is taking shape in my mind's eye.

As for the glowing circular areas in the photograph of Six Black Birds - a friend of mine swears they are entities, presences of energy captured by the camera because of their interest in what's going on...  Sounds good to me.

So Fragile A Fire