The Priming Process and A History of Designs

Preparation of the wall is moving along slowly but all-too-surely.... bringing the day of the first brushstroke closer into view. The paint crew who is priming/sealing the wall washed everything down Sun June 7, then it sat untouched for a full week while we waited for storms to subside, and for Sherwin Williams to deliver the primer. Sherwin Williams donated 25 gallons of primer -yay!- but we had to wait for them to pick it up from Louisville last week and lost our one sunny day.) They started priming last Sunday, and only got a quarter done before it started pouring down again, then I stopped by Monday and two guys were up on the lift doing the rest. The primer is a masonry sealer and block filler in one, so they worked it in with rollers and brushes to smooth out the rough texture of the wall. Hopefully this will help paint to go on smoother, and save my paintbrushes from going bald. They ran out of primer, though, so we've got to get a few more gallons... and then they're going to put a coat of weather-bond-something-or-other to seal the primer before I can paint over it.

Check out the 3-story tall ladder to the right of the photo... the painters are using it to prime over the satellite dish. One of my nightmares is painting an entire mural using that ladder.

While I've been waiting for the wall to be ready, I've been refining the design. I figured it was about time I started using paint on a sketch instead of just pencil. My nature is resistant to over-planning anything, but I've had to get over that because extensive planning is what will make the mural painting process go like clockwork, and thus go quicker than if I just jump up there and start painting and making stuff up like I usually do. It's a lot more difficult to experiment and try things out on a whim with such a large scale, because it takes much longer to fix things that don't work.

This is my "studio," in the kitchen, next to the window:

The next photo is the latest of the design, although it's not yet finished. It probably never will be. There are vines stretching across the wall behind the frame, and last night Leticia had an idea for the vines to connect with the twisty golden shapes that make up the frame. So I began working on that idea late last night.

The idea is that the frame surrounds the main image of the steamboat, and in each inset of the frame are different scenes of Madison. There are 18 different scenes, and mural sponsors can choose which scene of Madison they'd like to sponsor. For example, Hanover College is a sponsor, and they chose historic Parker Auditorium as their "scene," so Parker will be painted in one of the insets. The banner underneath the painting of Parker will read "Parker Auditorium, sponsored by Hanover College."

The steamboat will be the Revonah, which was operated off the banks of the Ohio here in Madison. It's sponsored by the grandson of Captain Selby Turner, who ran the boat in the early 1900s.

Next is the painting in an earlier stage. I'm working off of a sketch I did with colored pencil:

The rest of the images below show paintings and sketches I did last summer/fall, just planning out how to work out the frame idea. I am not proud of these paintings, but you gotta go through the bad to get to the good! I included them here because they show the progression of how I got to my current design.

This one is a detail of of one of the insets, showing the Broadway Fountain:

Here I did a sketch with the general positioning of the windows on the wall of Shipley's, which I have to design around:

Early sketch of a generic steamboat:

I like this one because it reminds me of the detail work on old pirate ships or buried treasure chests... but not very Madison-esque I suppose:

If you're into raindances, maybe do a reverse one for me to chase these June storms away! Priming/prepping will hopefully be finished soon, then it will be my turn to brave the lift and paint til I can paint no more.