Blogito

This is a baby blog post. I'm back in prep mode - lots of planning, lots of emailing, very little actual painting.

I do have one little painting to share though - the cell-phone picture kind, so be forgiving about the image quality. This tree is outside my studio window, and is lit from beneath by a streetlight. At dusk the sky behind it gets to be this superblue that silhouettes the whole thing... it's nice. 

Still trying to get more casual about picking up a brush - I'm 100x more comfortable with pencil because that's my default tool. If I can get that comfortable with painting, new worlds will open I'm pretty sure. 

In other news, I added a glamorous slideshow to the top of my Mural Portfolio page. I realized I didn't have one good spot to just show off pretty pictures... so now I do. Check-check it out.

State of Affairs

Okay, it's time for another general update. Once again, radio silence has been a result of general productivity, so I happily have a lot of ground to cover here! 

 

June started with Arts in the Alley, a non-profit I've been involved with for a while, which runs marathon volunteer mural-painting events. We worked for two days at Hospital Hospitality House in downtown Richmond, in which time we painted SEVEN MURALS. Woohoo! I think I'm going to make a guest appearance on their blog at some point talking about my work with them. In the meantime, here's a couple of shots of my wall taken by the superfine Firefly Imageworks, and you can see more photos from the event at their facebook page.

 

On the HerrSuite front, I have just passed off two projects to their new owners - one mural and one sign.

The mural is in the future nursery of a couple living in the fan. My only direction was for it to be gender-neutral and whimsical with a soft color palette.  They've agreed to let me come back and take pictures of the room once they've got it all done up with a crib, etc. So I'll be holding off on a full project debriefing about it until then. In the meantime here's a few pictures I took pre-furniture. 

 

My other finished project, the sign, is for Jennifer of Red Lintu, a pop-up jewelry shop on etsy and at a craft fair near you (if you live in Richmond.) "Lintu" means bird in Finnish - the name of the business is in memory of the Jennifer's grandmother. The necklace pictured is based on an actual piece from the shop.

Jennifer chose a male house finch to represent her 'red lintu'. This is especially appropriate because, like Jennifer, house finches are indigenous to the west and brought east. 

To the right is one of the lovely reference pictures I used to learn about what these guys look like in flight. 

In its frame

In its frame

 

I've also finished a sketchbook, which is pretty exciting because that takes me forever. Many of my friends and classmates zip through these things, but I'm more of a plodder. I've recently decided to double down on my efforts to work on drawing and painting outside of my full-fledged projects (something I decide anew every few months - like a diet or exercise routine). You can see the scan-worthy pages of it on my sketchblog, sketcherr.tumblr.com. The posts are one page each and sorted by sketchbook via links on the left of the site. This most recent sketchbook is called flatleaf.

I'll put the cream of the crop (just the one or two best pages) in the "Other Work" section of my site, which if you haven't checked out, you totally should. It's where cool stuff like the Red Lintu sign ends up - anything that isn't a mural.

 

That's all the big stuff - there's always future projects that I don't want to jinx, as well as more general happening things, like...

I've been making a habit of setting up coffee dates with people I call my 'business crushes' - other Richmond entrepreneurs with a creative bent - to learn about their experiences running a business, working with clients, collaborating, and so on. I've met some really awesome people this way, and totally recommend it for any of my peers. It's amazing what can happen if you just ask :) It's even led to at least one cool future job....! 

Now that it's way less freezing and way more sweltering, I've also been working in the studio a lot more (fans are cheaper than space heaters.) I got a giant table up there thanks to Sue Henshaw, ex-potter, and a couple strong friends. I'm trying to make a habit of posting on facebook when I plan to be there for a while - I love having company while I work and there's so much space - any of you folks are welcome to drop by and say hi or beat me at darts or do some pull-ups or even draw a bit.

Also, I'm only a few weeks out from a big trip - first to White Lake, NY for the Cobalt Studios Summer Scene Painting class, then to ICELAND with my family. I'll be gone for 4 weeks, and am actually running into a little trouble trying fit all the work I can in before I leave - a good problem to have, I think. I am actually booked several weeks out! I think! Sort of! Oh my god!

So I guess I'll start working on that and stop typing. TTFN~

Social 52

Here at HerrSuite we are keeping the party train going strong - I finished this mural this week, and this weekend I will be working with Arts in the Alley at Hospital Hospice House to paint another.

The new restaurant Social 52 replaced the restaurant Avalon on Main St at Mulberry a little less than a year ago, and they still have some work to do on their 'presence' in the popular bar-hopping area.  I developed a design for the large blank wall facing up-street towards Starlite and Three Monkeys, based on the current owners' information on the history of the building as an old A&P.

(A second mural might come into play featuring the antiquated A&P logo on the interior of the building, so that people can make the connection between the two.)

 

As I was painting, I heard that many passers-by are still surprised to see Avalon gone, and I even witnessed some late-night patrons asking what the '52' I was painting was for. This clean, bright, highly visible sign will be a big help in making this new spot recognizable and distinct.

The view from Robinson and Main, in front of Starlite

This was a fast-and-furious mural for me - got the whole thing up in two and a half work days, with a helping hand from a few friends (Matt and Nathan and Tom, you rock!). For the projector to show up on the wall, and to avoid the heat of the day, I worked late into the night, which meant I was a one-woman inverted parade for the line of people out the door at around midnight on Friday. (This was all kinds of fun and awkward, and I realized I sort of like painting in front of a crowd!)

Lots of these people were very confused by the projector light on the wall, and the sight of me on scaffolding painting the background white layer. It sort of looks like I'm painting the color on, but with a magic brush that paints all the colors at once. My favorite drunkie comment of the night went as follows:

Dudes A and B are in a larger alphabet of dudes, all musing on the strange sight in front of them. Dude A finally comprehends that I am not painting the colors, they are projected. A second later Dude B gets it too.

Dude B is flabbergasted and says "Oh! I get it! You're cheating!"

DUDE A IS EMBARRASSED AT HIS IGNORANCE AND SAYS "DUDE. NO. IT'S SCIENCE."

 

 

CORRECT, Dude A.

"Science" pictured above

To see more pictures and a before-&-after comparison, CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE PROJECT PAGE for this mural.