Celebration!!! SQ FAIR Lima mural for 2014 completed!

So wonderful to complete this monumental task assigned to me!    I am still not on 'normal time' yet, but in a week or so, I should be. What a diverse group of people to have the pleasure of capturing in paint. Great fun to host their sponsors/family members in the studio to add their personal touch and paint their initials on.

 

 

 

 Thanks for following along and I have been asked if I would like to be considered for 

the mural artist for 2015!



Barry Ruben...Need a hand? How to improvise..

Working on portrait number 3, Barry Ruben. Great challenges here, as the full body shot was in a suit and the face shot was in a reds uniform..........how to marry the two. Plus, I was missing the entire right arm in the full body shot and most of the left hand in the close up.

I determined it would work better if he were facing slightly to the left to keep the vision flowing across the mural, so I elected to 'flip' the body. This solved a couple of problems, as I was able to them use the left hand in the body shot to sketch from and just change the angle. I drew a rectangle over the right hand as a guide; my sketch still ended up being a little large so I used my printer to reduce my drawing 10% and it fit just right.

 

Changing the position of the hand presented another problem; the extended fingers now looked awkward , so I made them appear to be curled up more.

Barry Ruben, co-owner of Lima Bargain Center and owner of the semi-pro baseball team, the Lima Locos. ( The sponsors are in sw Florida and would have loved to have been here to add a stroke or two!       Well, guess that is a small price to pay for being where it is warm and sunny in January.)

Invite! They will come!

Getting the first portrait under my belt was a huge relief, for now I feel I have a handle on how I am going to approach this. Having a game plan is of the utmost importance! Leaving room for some flexibility adds to the difficulty but must be done.

To make this a truly 'community' mural, I decided to extend an invite for each sponsor to come apply a few brushstrokes to their chosen honoree, allowing for more ownership and pride in the mural. Truth is, I get the biggest kick out of sharing! Today, Kathy Seitz seized the moment to become a part of the history of this mural and painted in her father, Joe O'Brien's trousers. ( My husband Claude posed for me, as we had no photo reference for his pants). It worked!

Dick and Kathy have been a delight to work with through this entire process and leave me eagerly anticipating getting on to the next one. Knowing they were very pleased with my interpretation sure made my day!

 

As an added perk, I asked Kathy to sign her initials by her father's trousers, to show everyone where she painted on the mural! Look at that smile......