Last year, a couple of months before Christmas, I was asked to paint a mural for the General Store in Lake Tyers. Such an exciting project!
I knew I would have to stay true to my style and come up with an image in grey tones. A purely black and white picture would be too harsh on the building near the lake, so I definitely wanted to add a splash of colour to smooth it out.
The owners and I agreed on a design and off I went drafting like crazy on paper and practicing my first sketches.
The painting took 4 weeks and turned out to be an unbelievable learning curve. Here is what I took away from it:
Painting is hard!
Going from graphite pencil to paint made me really appreciate how versatile pencils are.
I asked the local hardware supplier for advice on paint and discovered that when dry, water-based paint stays on and becomes waterproof. That was the first fact which made no sense to me!
Also, paint dries a different shade than when first applied. It turnes out that it dries darker. An other interesting challenge!
Graphite is very smooth and forgiving. You can erase mistakes. With paint, even though there is always a way to fix a mistake with more paint, matching the right colours are very tricky.
Finally, the smooth shading created while the paint is wet suddenly disappears as it dries, creating much harsher lines and brush strokes as anticipated.
But on the upside, I learnt that I can use the different stages of paint to create different effects. White highlights are incredibly effective when applied to the dry wall.
Getting your scale right is VERY important.
As with drawing on paper, I first traced my grid to make sure that every shape and tone was in the right place and in the right size.
When I draw on paper, I am able to look back through my phone and spot the areas which look different to the reference photo and correct them.
On the wall, I had to step bak to compare the overall image, but it was obviously too far to fix it while looking at it. So the working scale had to remain an area of around 10 cm at the time throughout the whole process.
People love to watch work in progress.
Many artists compare creating art to a form of meditation. It takes you to a quiet place where time completely vanishes. You concentrate on small areas at the time and nothing else matters. When painting in a public place, people will take a peak at what you are doing, ask questions and start conversations. It can be quite tricky to go back to the exact spot that you were working on after having stepped back for a few minutes.
Outside.... It rains!
Yep.... Pretty obvious!
A huge challenge for me was adapting to the weather. There were some days of 35 degrees when the paint on the wall dried as soon as it was applied. And days of strong rain where it would wash away the wet paint. It was frustrating to consciously choose to stop working in the middle of the day when there was still so much to do.
My biggest challenge of all: Believe in yourself
Some artists are very confident in their work; they just do it.
Personally, I still doubt my work. I am learning to be happy with it....
And as my skills are improving, I finally have times thinking: "Oh! That actually looks good!". But overall, my thoughts are: "I should have done this bit like that. This should be darker. Am I doing the right thing? Are people going to like it?" Etc.
When drawing alone at home, I can have all these voices and doubts, and still keep concentrating on the work until it is finished.
When you work outside for everyone to see, all your doubts are magnified. You are under a microscope.
There are certain steps of painting where the work is messy or doesn't quite look right, particularly as you build up the different layers and shading of the image. It is really important to concentrate on doing everything in the right order.
In conclusion.... Would I do it again?
You bet! My ideal project would be to draw the image at home and have it transfered onto a vinyl (which then gets applied to the wall). That way, I could still use my most comfortable technique, and draw hail, rain or shine!
How about you... Have you worked on something which took you completely out of your comfort zone?
Would you do it again?
What is on your bucket list?
This is a great post, Cecile. Your work method en plein air and en intérieure is as interesting to me as the final product, and here both are impressive. I feel inclined to go to Lake Tyers and plant my Défence D’Afficher bill adjacent to the mural!