As promised in my last newsletter, I've put together a review of my recent projects in Fort Collins. In May, the florist who owns
"bloom simply significant" moved her shop into a first floor suite of the America Building (155 N. College Avenue), which is where my studio is. Our landlords commissioned me to paint a mural to add some color to the shop's alley entrance. With a list of the florist's favorite plants, I sketched a design that would fit nicely around bloom's door and awning. I had time before starting transformer cabinet murals for the city, so I was able to paint this floral mural in late May and early June, 2019.
My challenges included: maneuvering a large, folding ladder back and forth, transferring my design -- which ended up being quite complex -- onto the building's stucco wall, and then painting the design onto that very rough, stucco wall. With the same brand of paint as I used for the Global Village Museum mural last year (and that was used for my Lolli-poppies mural in 2015), I roughed in the general shapes of each flower and leaf. After some trial-and-error, I found the right brushes to push the paint into the porous surface and still produce the crisp outlines I wanted for each
'character.' I then painted bold, black outlines and finer detail marks throughout the mural. As a final step, I added highlights and shading to selected flowers for greater readability.
CLICK HERE to see my full album of progress photos. I look forward to more opportunities to design and execute larger murals like this!
Earlier this spring, I painted a "beetle on a beetle." My client had experienced a fender bender on her VW bug, and wanted to use the insurance money to add some bling to her ride. We agreed that a golden sunflower would stand out nicely against the car's antique blue color. For fun, we added a ladybug
beetle on one of the sunflower petals. After I finished painting the mural, Julie took her VW to a custom car painter to have it clear-coated.
Keep an eye out for this one-of-a-kind VW beetle on the streets of Fort Collins!
Another look back: the mask I created for the Museum of Art's annual fundraiser in March was purchased by a friend of mine, a retired judge in town (I love it when that happens!). He told me that
"Higher Ground" is the perfect piece for the top of their stairs.
To see my album of step-by-step progress photos of the mask, just click THIS LINK.
And one more look over my shoulder: the winning bidders for my painting of a pipevine swallowtail butterfly were another couple of friends. The organizer of the
Blossoms and Butterflies event, Peggy Lyle, and her husband Chris are my
"Bold Beauty" painting's new owners, and they also claim to have the perfect place to display it. They enjoyed hearing how I'd salvaged the plexiglass-framed artwork from a dumpster, sanded and painted over it, using only paint I obtained from the Larimer County Landfill's hazardous waste recycling facility. That's Chris with the antennae in the photo above with my husband Doug. :)
