Your Guide to the Mural-Painting Method (Part 2)

As the second mural of the Saskatchewan Government Employees' Union (SGEU) commission comes swiftly to fruition -as promised- I will take a pause for the cause and post some more pictures of the "work-in-progress". Sometimes it's a challenge to keep up with myself, as once I get painting, I have to make a conscious effort to stop long enough to photograph my progress! You will recall that the last picture(s) in my previous post showed the addition of a translucent "violet" glaze. After this, it was time to add the "translucent blue" glaze.

The shadowy bits really start to sing with the addition of a "blue glaze".

With the addition of each successive glaze -in this case blue- the image increasingly "pops".

When contrasted with the previous pictures (sans blue) you can see the amplification of the detail.

It's always exciting to watch the images clarify with each new glaze. Not only does each step add appreciable detail, but also beefs up the contrast...which of course is fundamental to the process.

The shapes and forms take on a more vivid appearance...

I decide to "pan" across the surface of the mural so you could see how the "global" approach to glazing...persisting in completing each successive treatment from left to right, and from up to down, before moving on to the next glaze. This approach creates a dynamic uniformity; put another way, visual continuity.

A sweeping view of the mural: 6' high (plus the extensions) x 24 running feet.

Remember, there is absolutely NO white aka light as of yet. The background hue -a warm golden orange- is standing by as the neutral base. It is only after all of the "tonal study" is completed that white is introduced for the first time.

A Candid Video that Explains Purpose of SGEU Murals

Yesterday a friend of mine visited our gallery and requested that I explain the "plan" regarding the two murals commissioned by Saskatchewan Government Employees' Union (SGEU) here in my home province. She then proceeded to catch my response on her video camera.





To reiterate, once the two murals are finished, they will be permanently housed at the new SGEU HQ in Regina, and will be photographed with a large format digital camera. The original images will then be enlarged 200% to be pressed into service as highway billboards across the province. A design firm based in Vancouver will be charged with the task of computer generating a slogan and the SGEU logo, to be superimposed over my artwork. As you can imagine, this is all very exciting for me, because my artwork will potentially be viewed by millions of eyeballs in such a high-traffic public setting.

1st of 2 Murals for SGEU 90% Finished

After another weekend of painting, the first of the two murals commissioned for SGEU is about 90% finished. How do I know that, you ask? Here's how... typically I use a technique that requires exactly 13 translucent glazes...I counted!

              

Mural to Hibernate ( 'til spring '13 )

Mounting this mural will not be easy.

It comes as no surprise with a mural project of this scale that the permanent mounting will be a formidable undertaking, especially now that the planning committee has decided that the superstructure will be engineered to hold the fifty 4' x 8' panels up so that the bottom will begin ten feet in the air. This means that the top of the mural extant will soar a full thirty feet off terra firma. Considering that the surface of the mural is a whopping one-thousand and six-hundred square feet, it will constitute an engineering challenge to overbuild the structure to withstand the inevitable force of what can amount to gale force winds here on the Canadian prairies. That is a huge 'sail'! 

In the coming months, we will be unveiling the master plan for the dedicated site where the mural will be installed, just south of Young School facing the #2 highway. The plan is to erect the mural on its own site complete with a drive-in access off the highway, a rest stop with washrooms and of course a viewing bench at the so-called 'sweet spot' where the view is optimal. I mention this because you will find that a certain distance is required for the best viewing experience...too close a viewing position will be counter-productive as it is so huge that the whole thing will not be visible. I don't think there will be any issues with distant viewing; I have looked at the mural from as far away as bout 100 feet (inside the rink) and can report that a distance of twice that far would still be well within reason.

Taking this into consideration, the committee has in their wisdom opted to contract with an engineering firm in Saskatoon to draw up and certify the plans for the steel structure that must be over-built by a factor of X10 to ensure that it truly is permanent.

Thankfully, we have a very generous corporate sponsor in place that is underwriting the cost of engineering. Now the trick is to generate the final chunk of financing required to pay for the actual steel, cement and hardware that the engineers will call for with their plans.

Nor will it be cheap.

Word on the street is that the cost of erecting this mural will likely surpass the fees that I have required for my professional services as the designer and painter of the mural proper! 

But it WILL happen. In the spring of '13.

Recalling that the mural was painted inside the hockey rink at Young, it only stands to reason that as the weather evolved from fall to early winter, it was imperative to clear out of that space to allow the rink committee to proceed with preparing the natural ice for the onslaught of the hockey season, as the Young rink hosts a very busy agenda of games starting pdq.

Although I would be the first to freely admit that this 'process' is about as exciting as watching paint dry, I thought I would faithfully chronicle the de-construction of the mural as it came down off its temporary frame and was securely packed and stored in its steel container ( "C-Can" ) where it will hibernate until the spring of 2013.

Dismantling the temporary frame was a fairly tedious undertaking that involved a lot of un-screwing. We planned ahead and used screws throughout in anticipation that it would have to disassembled after the mural's completion.

Shewin and I stacked all of the panels in position in the corner of the rink closest to the exit, in preparation for their winter storage.

I suppose that this picture might seem to be rather anti-climatic...but trust me, it took a LOT of energy to get to this point where all that remains standing is the basic skeleton, ready to drop onto the rink floor for the final dis-assembly. Remember, the frame is a full eighty by sixteen feet, so it represents a bit of work even at this late juncture.

With the help of a couple of very generous volunteers, we were finally able to send the wall back down on its face for the final un-screwing. As you can see, only about three pieces of lumber were shattered in the process. Not bad considering the huge 'boom' that occurred at the moment of impact.

Once all of the panels were removed from the frame and stacked methodically in the corner  of the rink, we recruited several generous volunteers from the community to assist in carrying each panel into the C-Can for winter storage.

All of the fifty panels were stacked with spacers in between and beneath to allow air flow as well as to prevent any shifting over the winter. Great care was taken to ensure that all the panels were not allowed to contact any of their neighboring panels so that scraping or scratching of the precious painted surfaces would be prevented.

A final sweep of the snow, dust and debris was carefully performed by Dennis Sather of the Centennial Committee before the C-Can was sealed for the winter.

'forever YOUNG' mural approaches 10K hits!

This morning I see that this blog has generated over 9100 hits since I started posting progress reports on the 'forever YOUNG' mural project about five weeks ago. That is a good thing! Thank you to everyone who is following. It means a lot to me. I do notice, however, that there are not that many of  you who have subscribed to the updates. For those of you who are not familiar with this, it is very easy. You will see a sliding tab on the upper right-hand side of the page here. When you hover over it with your cursor you will see it pop out with four options. One of which is 'subscribe'. When you click there, you will be asked to supply your e-mail address. So when I post my next update (usually about 2 a week) you will receive a notice directly in your inbox. So you will never have to wonder when and if I have posted. 


There, now that that bit of housekeeping is done, let's get back to the fun stuff!

At the end of each day, if I still have the energy, I usually climb up to the top of a VERY tall step ladder ( I think it's a 16' ) to take a distant, high shot of the day's progress. You have seen this before! At this point we can see that the overall effect is becoming very colorful, yet thanks to all of the under-painting there is a discernible continuity throughout the entire work. That is, indeed, one of the most powerful unifying aspects of working in the 'global' glazing technique.

You can see that the large portraits -about 6 feet from top to bottom- are coming to life as each successive glaze is applied with increasingly more resolution.

Now that the grain bin is painted its typical 'red' color the left-hand side of the mural begins to look very colorful.

The center of the mural top section is now virtually finished. There will be some more detailing but you will not see any really noticeable difference unless you examine it very closely.

Moo! These three critters are just about life-size...but will loom large over the buildings of Main Street Young when the bottom is completed. My idea of a little visual fun, playing with the scale within the composition.

Filling in more detail in the background field tends to make the team of oxen and Dennis Sather's aunt (operating the washing machine) stand out that much more.

'forever YOUNG' Mural Shaping Up

Now the full-spectrum tonal treatment is beginning to be eclipsed by the natural colors as they dominate the visual landscape.

The long view shows the horizon of the mural starting to be easily recognizable by the various 'fingerprint' images that begin to go pop.

More and more local people along with their friends and relatives are trickling in for a sneak preview as word leaks out to coffee row that this ambitious project is taking form right under the collective noses of the community.

I usually just keep right on working when curious visitors -many of which are stakeholders in the project as they have lent their family name and cherished archival images to the overall design. Every single person and event that will be ultimately represented are specific to the community of Young. Between myself and the steering committee we scoured through well over one-hundred images to narrow down the scope to the final authorized design.

The large portraits on the upper right-hand side begin to dominate the space, appearing to loom large behind the word 'forever', which is an important graphic element in the overall design.

I decided to frame this photo to include the entire word 'YOUNG', or at least the portion of the word visible in the upper 3/5ths of the mural. The length of the word exceeds forty feet. With the addition of all of the various details and color fields behind and around the word, it now starts to take on a three-dimensional effect...hovering in front of all the activity. You will see as the painting progresses that there is actually a playful relationship between the graphic 'YOUNG' and its environ.

The life-sized team of four oxen at the upper right-hand side of the mural almost appear to be protruding out of the panel, thanks to the forceful use of strong contrasting colors and a simplification of the shapes and textures to be recognizable in a slightly exaggerated, theatrical style of painting. Mural-painting is much more than merely painting large. Successful murals must be designed and painted to be viewed from a great distance so the features must out of necessity be graphically vital.

Dennis Sather's aunt is shown operating her new-fangled washing machine. At the time the original picture was taken, this machine would have been a top-of-the-line modern convenience for the farm-wife. This picture has about five glazes so far. Probably about 5-7 to go.

Blue Surge (not to be confused with Red Serge)

Today felt like an early 'surge' day...ergo my title for today's post Blue Surge. Finally, it's starting to look and feel like a painting! It takes a while and a lot of brush swinging to get to this point where I get to feel that I am overcoming the sheer physical size of the start-up but after today I feel like I have a bit more wind in my sails so to speak.

It was much quicker to apply the richer glaze of pthalo/cobalt blue to intensify the upper reaches of the sky off an extension ladder than going through the laborious process of shifting the scaffold across the eighty foot running length of the mural.

Yet more regions of blue are introduced into the bottom panels, throwing the figures, horses and farmyard buildings into sharp contrast.

While the large portraits remain dark at this moment (due to not a smidgen of 'light' yet introduced) they appear to almost hover in a three-dimensional contrast to the blue atmospheric effect in the background.

 

With the dialed-up blue initiated the various shapes and objects in the middle and fore-ground take on a surprising urgency. Suddenly, things seem to really pop.

 

The potash mine appears looming on the distant horizon behind the family dressed for chillier weather. At this moment, all of the blues of the sky are introduced as transparent glazes into the shadowy regions of the potash mine. This effectively mesmerizes the eye into accepting that the mine is set off at a considerable distance into the extreme background; the very blue of the air is suspended in such great breadth as to colorize the distant edifice with the barest hint of 'blue'.

Move Over Orange...

My computer-generated rendering that demonstrates approximately how the finished mural will appear.

...there's a red that wants to meet you!

A pail of red glaze all ready for application. The acrylic pigment is very concentrated and for my purposes must be diluted to a semi-transparent state for glazing over the original orange glaze. All of the subsequent glazes yet to come will be similarly transparent/translucent so that in the end all of the global glazes will retain their power while interacting in varying degrees with their fellow glazes..one big happy family of co-existing hues in a full-spectrum tonal analysis.

Even with the addition of just the second ( of a total of about 10-12 glazes at least) the red glaze, you can see how the forms immediately start to pop.

Rolling down the plank rail in front of the mural with paint-brushes flying...

A good day's work gets me to about the half-way point of the 80' wall.

Dennis Sather caught me up on the scaffold just as I was getting close to finishing the eighty-foot pass with the red glaze at the eight foot level.

The 'skyline' begins to appear as the red glaze is completed at the horizon.

The same thing from a different perspective that favors the right-hand side of the mural.

Painting the Beast: 'forever YOUNG' mural fired up!

Mock-up shows the scale of the finished mural-to-be.

Applying the first few strokes of rich orange glaze.

After an intense week of construction, I was in a position to get started on what I love best: mural-painting. As usual, I have primed the strata a warm golden-flesh tone to begin. I work in the old European technique of laying down perhaps 12-15 transparent to translucent layers in a full-spectrum tonal study before applying the 'native' colors. My first step is to differentiate between light and dark by applying a warm orange glaze to 'everything dark or shaded'.

I don't mess around once I start painting. There's a LOOONG way to go!

Feeling good to be underway after all the prep work. Delayed gratification ain't all it's made out to be.

Starting off at the upper left-hand corner.

There will ultimately be dozens of passes on the rolling scaffold as the transparent glazes are systematically laid in. I will be applying 'global' glazes, meaning ALL of each glaze will be completed before moving on to the next color. So yeah, the sky will remain orange for quite some time! This is not a process that can be rushed.

When I paint a mural on this scale, I like to stay organized, working methodically from the upper left-hand corner and across the expanse of the wall to the right.

When working on a mural of this scale, I have to stay organized with a long-term plan of attack. There is not a whole lot of random painting that goes on, especially when laying in the foundation of the piece. This may surprise you (or not) but I apply precisely the same methodology to a piece on this scale as I would with an easel painting. I won't go into detail here, you will see as the days and weeks go by how it systematically evolves.

Day 1 of painting yields a good result.

Before I move on to the second glaze, all of the rich orange will be applied to begin the laborious process of separating light from dark.