Get 'er done: Mural Edition

Scratch that one off the bucket list. Large-scale mural in public setting: CHECK. Dear readers, since we're good friends, I will tell you a secret. When the Portland Children's Museum asked me to paint a mural in their new Pet Hospital exhibit, at first I was afraid. I was petrified. I wondered how I'd ever paint a picture at that size. I had never a) painted such a large mural before in such a b) heavily-trafficked area, in c) the place where I work part-time and thus would have to face my co-workers and an ugly mural every day in the event that it sucked.

Dear readers, I will tell you another secret: I am really quite pleased with how it turned out.

That's the finished mural above- and here's how it all went down.

It started with a sketch, obviously. The new exhibit is a play veterinary clinic with stuffed animals the kids can take care of. The exhibit planners wanted a mural for the dog park section. 

I then drew a pretty lenient grid on the sketch for transferring to the Big Screen.

I learned a lot from doing this mural that I think will be muy helpful in my book illustrations. For one thing, the joy and pleasure that having a color sketch brings to me. Yes, YES, I know that painters have been making color sketches for CENTURIES, and I am a little late to this realization. That seems to be the story of my life: I am currently watching season 2 of Mad Men, and read my first Diary of a Wimpy Kid on the bus today. (*Side note: both totally amazing! FYI!)

Anyhoo, that part was easy peasy. Now on to the Uncharted Territory:

Luckily, I had The Grid to help me chart it. It really did help, but I used that grid fairly flexibly towards the end there. And YES, sharp-eyed readers, that IS a copy of The Curious Garden by Peter Brown for color reference!

All drawn in. Then on to COLOR! Just as in my normal illustrations I used acrylics, and I tried to get in all of the colors first before building up any one section.

I painted...
...and painted...
... and painted. It took a good two weeks, and frankly, it got so I dreamed about painting flower pots, and I didn't even want to look at a dog on the sidewalk.

And then it was done.

Some details:

Take that, Jack Nicholson/Morgan Freeman.