Mooney Museum Mural, Day 6B

The first thing I did on Day #6 (after admiring the view, thinking, peeling the old paint off my palette) was to realize that in order to move ahead on the first basket in the circle, it needed a base coat of paint so it could dry so I could draw on it so I could paint the design.

That was an action packed sentence. It was an action-packed day.

Yokuts were known for their baskets, and this museum is known for them too.

I went inside to mix an appropriate and believable main basket color.

Got it – let’s go!

Oh boy. That is one rough surface.

Next, I drew on the guidelines with blue chalk. (They don’t show much in this photo.)

After the base coat of basket color was on, and the lines were drawn, I did all the things I showed you on Day 6A.

Then, it was time to stop for lunch. It is hard to stop, but I’ve found that if I don’t stop for at least 15 minutes, I get confused, indecisive, and a little bit stupid after about 6 hours of painting.Okay, that’s a long enough break, Central California Artist. Get back to work.

I mixed up a very dark brown and a lighter reddish brown to duplicate the other colors in the basket. Then I just dove in.

On mural painting Day #7, I’ll tighten up the triangles and try to put in a hint of basket coils. A paintbrush is NOT a pencil and acrylic paints are NOT oils. Instead of looking like a basket as I had hoped, it is simply a depiction of a Yokuts basket design.

AND, I hope to mix up a color like the original wall color to paint the inner part of the circle.

The end of Day 6. Stay tuned.

(And if you know my Sandy Eggo sister, wish her a happy birthday today. She doesn’t read my blog, so no need for me to say anything to her here.)

Mooney Museum Mural, Day 6A

This is how Mooney Grove looked on the morning of Day #6. There was a lot of work ahead, so I have divided that day into 2 blog posts – one today, one for Monday.

First I spent some time studying the Sequoia mural to find all the things that weren’t quite good enough. While I was thinking, I peeled the old paint off my palette.

There are many things that are bothering me about these areas, including the close oranges not being bright enough on the first mural.

Below are some of the fixes.

Several folks have said, “I hope that shrub in front of the Sequoias gets removed”. I think it is pretty, especially when the light hits the new reddish growth, which matches the Sequoia trees.

Look – Flat Stanley paid a visit to the mural! (It’s a thing that school kids do that I don’t really understand.) I appreciated the laugh, and they appreciated the tape. The orange grove now has a hidden item.The Big Trees now have a hidden item.

To be continued on Monday. . .

 

Mooney Museum Mural, Day 5

Day 5 of painting the mural on the Tulare County Museum in Mooney Grove was actually Day #2 on the Giant Sequoia trees.I thought I might be able to finish it that day.Then I thought I couldn’t.Then I thought maybe I could.Then I didn’t think it would be possible.Got it covered, but it needs better detail, some corrections, the usual adjustments.Nice new awnings over the entry door on the left and the office door on the right.

Mooney Museum Mural, Day 3B

After I finished the mural on the left side panel, I moved over to the right side panel to begin painting redwood trees, AKA sequoia gigantea, AKA Big Trees.

After looking through a small stack of pretty good photos of redwoods in sunlight, I chose one. Then I looked down at my scattering of business cards and got a laugh.Clearly, I like this particular view.

For once in my muralizing life, I wasn’t paralyzed by indecision. This felt easy to begin.There is no pattern to how I move around this wall – just a little here, a little there, maybe I can do this, if I do that it might help me see the proportions more correctly, up the ladder, down the ladder, step back, try this color. No matter what part I work on, the wall is getting covered.

I decided to put in sky colored background to define the edges of the trees, (including some smaller trees).Then I decided to get a bit more systematic, and work left to right.Then I didn’t want to work from the ladder any more, so I hunkered down in the mud to work on the bases of the trees.Not bad for a day’s work, eh? What makes this so pleasant and makes all this roaming around the wall in a random method possible is the fact that the wall is north-facing, and I never have to worry about protecting my palette or brush from the direct sun.

 

Mooney Museum Mural, Day 3A

First, the name of the museum is Tulare County Museum, and it is in Mooney Grove. This is a county park. Just wanted to clarify, because the title of my blog posts about this mural make it sound as if the museum is called the “Mooney Museum”. I just like alliteration.

This is how the mural looked when I arrived on Day #3.

The brighter orange is poppies, the lighter orange is fiddleneck, and the lightest yellow is mustard. (You’re welcome – I know you were wondering.)

There were a few details left to add to finish this one.Better.Best.

There is too much to show you on today’s post, so Day 3B will appear tomorrow.

Mooney Museum Mural, Day 2

The mural looked like this in the morning. If you ran past it, it looked finished, but it needed detail.

Those middle hills were a bit confounding, so I just hunkered down in the mud to plant an orange grove. Oh-oh, this is going to be S L O W. Some friends stopped by, and I decided to be like Tom Sawyer. If someone had let me paint on a public wall in a park when I was 8, I would have been paralyzed with doubt, but maybe have just gone for it anyway. I told Justin that it didn’t matter what he did, just make some marks to see what it felt like, and I’d paint over anything that turned out weird.

County Parks Director Neil suggested wildflowers, which OF COURSE I should have thought of myself, and OF COURSE I immediately added in.There are poppies, fiddleneck, and mustard. You might have to see them in person to fully appreciate them.

Next, I will finish the details above the grove – a barn, some non-grove-like trees, a couple of wind machines. Then, I’ll move to the panel on the far right.

Stay tuned!

A Day of Variety

Sometimes it is a little hard to work from home. There are many other things requesting attention, opportunities to be productive in other ways, chances to just lollygag around or find other occupations. Last week I had such a day.

It began with wandering outside while drinking coffee and seeing a bit of pruning, and then finding Tucker in my herb garden.

See why I want to be outside this time of year?

Notice that these flowers are in the primary colors.

Next, I made plans with a friend for a walk at the lake early in the afternoon, and that made me willing to dive back into work, knowing my time was limited to paint. Sometimes deadlines help me to focus.

This was dry enough to begin detailing until it was time to gather up my friend and head to Kaweah Lake. (Oh-oh, I can’t remember if it is Kaweah Lake or Lake Kaweah again; what’s with the mental block on this subject? This may be why we’ve always called it “The Lake”.) We just walked in the lake bottom, not close to the lake except where it covered the pretty bridge.

The lake level is rising slowly. We walked to beneath the Horse Creek Bridge, and the mustard was striking.

After our walk,  I was able to paint a bit longer on the Mineral King cabin oil painting commission. I think I can get even more detailed on this, but it needs to dry a bit more.

And thus we conclude a day of work combined with distractions.

Commissioned Mineral King Oil Painting

You saw this photo of the beginnings of a commissioned Mineral King oil painting.

Here is the reference photo for the little cabin.

The customer wanted it to be in a vertical format, and I suggested making Farewell Gap more dominant. She approved of that first sketch on the canvas, so I began painting.

This was a combination of the familiar and the fake with the goal of believability.

When this dries, I’ll start “drawing” with my paintbrush. Adding details to the cabin will be particularly enjoyable, because you may recall that I love to draw.

More Mineral King Oils

Drying in the morning sun; this time all three vertical 6×18″ Mineral King oil paintings are finished.

This is how they look in the afternoon light. I’ll wait until they are completely dry, then photograph them, because they are too big for the scanner.

Lupine comes in many colors, so I just mixed up a shade of bluish purple that looked good with the painting. The photo lupine color was too pink and it wasn’t believable to me.

Next, I moved on to the current painting of my favorite subject, the Oak Grove Bridge.

This is the stage where I detail it to the nth degree, the style of painting that plein air painters usually don’t bother with. (They might be too tired of swatting bugs by them.)

Oh my, I really like this one! (Yep, I am allowed to like my own work.)

Have you noticed that ever since I published Mineral King Wildflowers: Common Names that I almost always include wildflowers in my paintings? What took me so long to figure this out?

One more Mineral King painting, this one a commission, working from a customer photo and some conversation about how to present things. (Not the Honeymoon cabin – this cabin is no longer standing).Before I go any further, my customer will need to let me know if this is the arrangement she has in mind.

Finished Oak Tree Mural

Here are the better photos of the finished Oak Tree Mural, which I am renaming in my mind as Three Birds.