I can now say I've painted political art on a wall in East Los Angeles, lol. I think that rates in the top ten things I never thought I would do in my life. Though, I have a feeling this is only the beginning of stuff like that. At least I hope so.
It was a crazy beautiful day in Los Angeles. Blue skies, mid-sixties, nice breeze, and a really, really warm sun. There were no more excuses I could make as to why I couldn't do it. I even had the money to buy paint thanks to a close supporter of mine. The only barrier was my fear and I wasn't going to let that stand in the way.
I had no idea what kind of paint, what size, what brushes, pretty much anything, so I followed my gut with what I might need. Let me just tell you that a gallon of paint will go a long, long, long way when it comes to painting wall art. Stick with a quart the first time and you'll be more than okay. My piece ended up at 6ft by 6ft and I barely put a dent in the cans. My mind was on monochromatic, so black and white was a must. Color was on hold, especially at the cost of like $15+ for even the small ones. That was okay though, I didn't want to be too ambitious for this first one. I also remembered that my roommate had a cool looking turquoise that I was pretty sure I could work in sometime.
Getting back to the coffee shop with my loot, it was time to figure out exactly what I was going to paint. The first step was to lay down the base, my background for the entire image. It was a bit daunting. I stood there for quite a while trying to visualize what could fill the canvas.
Before I began my sketch a thought hit me. Rather, some advice from an artist friend. It was a side comment he'd made when we were looking at it together. 'Measure the outline so you can create a proportional sketch.' I really have issues with borders and keeping within them, and with this I really din't want to mess up. So, like a good artist I did what I was supposed to. Trust me, it helps, a lot. I do a lot of spontaneous paintings, but when you get into a public space, at least a little prep is highly recommended.
In the end I decided to go with something that I felt comfortable with and knew I could do pretty well. Something with a skull. I knew that wasn't enough though. I let my mind wander for a bit, seeing if there were any words that would float to the surface. Like some of the other free associations that come up occasionally on my images.
As I finished the 5, or maybe 6th rough sketch (gotta love the sketch with vine charcoal and erase method) a word did pop into my head. No idea why, but it did. I wasn't allowed to realize why until later, near the end of the painting, but we'll get to that. 'Identity.' I did 3 or 4 more roughs and finally had to tell myself to stop stalling. It's easy to put something like that off in order to 'prepare.' But, the more you prepare, the more the fear builds, the anxiety, and there comes a tipping point where you can either get going, or you might as well give it up for the day. I broke through the barrier and got started.
I was even smart enough to set up a GoPro to make a time-lapse of the entire thing... ;)
It all started with a rough sketch on the wall with a graphite stick. I knew from previous experiences marking things out on paintings that if I prepped too much there would be less life and chance for the spontaneous energy I love to inject so made careful sure to only do a basic outline. If you look really carefully at the picture you can see some of my prep on the right side of the canvas. The word at the bottom was a real pain in the ass though. For some reason I just couldn't get the spacing right with the letters. I spent maybe 15 or 20 minutes trying to figure it out but finally gave up when I started to get the feeling I needed to repaint the white. There was the basic idea of the letters...and I decided to trust myself for when the time came to put it into paint. Lots of lessons learned for the next time when it comes to measuring things out, and remembering to count how many letters there are in that word correctly, hehe.
The big thing is that I didn't let any of the hangups become a big thing. What kept the issues from blowing up is because the basic fact was, if I fucked up, I could paint over and redo it again. Not like all the ink drawings I do where you can't, cannot, mess up. My lust for adventure in permanence definitely payed off, hehe.
So, with a deep breath I opened up the can of black and began. I took some process pictures, but after a while I just trusted the GoPro would capture it all. Perhaps I should have set a time or something, so I could get properly spaced pics, but everything really went so fast that it would have disrupted the entire process. In total, I think this piece took about 2 hours from start to finish. Priming, maybe another 30-40 minutes of mostly waiting for things to dry.
When I got to this point...the last picture in the series, my mind wandered to color. How could I use the lovely blue that I had just sitting there, waiting? I knew I could finish this piece with just black and white, but I knew just a bit of color in the right place would really make things pop. It was a really tense moment. Yes, I knew I could repaint things if necessary, but, it would also feel a bit like cheating. When I put it down, I really had to make sure that I did it right. There were definitely a number of minutes I stood there contemplating.
Blue would explode things, in either a good way or a bad way...
In the end I trusted my gut (good thing) and didn't go overboard. I think I used the color in just the right way. If I had thrown it up on the skull, that would have changed the entire vibe of the painting.
Crap, I almost forgot one of the most important moments...I know I should try and figure out how to work this into the post correctly, but it's important enough to really make stand out by putting it out of order.
Remember how I said that the word that came to mind, 'Identity,' felt like a it was part of something more, but I wasn't sure what? At least I think I said that. But, anyways. I was standing there, me, the skull, the word, just looking at the piece, when more words came to mind. As a lot of things, I had no idea where they came from, but in my mind they completed the piece.
'We are all the same.'
It took me a minute to figure out why those words. Then it struck me. Underneath, we're all the same. We're just skeletons clothed in flesh. The color, type, location, whatnot, none of that really matters because that's just surface dressing. Media, the world, keeps on telling us to focus on what's different about each other and not on what's the same. Sometimes you need to break things down to their most basic level. That's what my unconscious mind had done...using a concept that I'd been playing with it had taken things to another level. It also might be the stupidest thing in the world...but those concepts are usually right next to each other on the spectrum, lol. Honestly, all that matters to me is impact. And from the comments I was getting from those who passed by, things were going pretty well.
The message was something that really stuck in my head. In Boyle Heights, where gentrification is the hot topic, people protesting, fighting for their communities, seeing new people flood into their neighborhood, being blasted by the media, accosted by police for the color of the skin and where they live, shit. It's not just a story in a paper, it's real life for them, well, us, every day. Two sides of a coin, different perspectives, yet, still rooted in the same place.
It was a crazy experience. I can barely sum it up in these words. My first wall, something political, people walking by and saying that they liked it. The grandma that walked by and chatting for a couple minutes was the best. She didn't speak fluent English, and my Spanish sucks, but she let me know she's so happy to see people doing art on walls, not graffiti. Truly a powerful moment for a new artist.
There was also a dick. Some dude who lived across the way. Yes, I get that people have different opinion on what is art, what is beautiful, and whatnot, but there are ways to go about it and ways to go about it. It was a crazy educational moment for me where the theoretical that people might not like it became an actual, and forced me to figure out how to deal with it. The way he complained reminded me of a pissed off 6year old who didn't and couldn't fully articulate their emotions/thoughts, but, still. And, I say that not because I was pissed at him, but because of how he went about it. Asking if I was a kid who could only scribble and if I could draw cats instead, happy cats, or dogs, well, it makes me scratch my head and wonder about adults nowadays, more so than before. Then he kept lingering around behind me angrily pacing about. The meme generation sigh. I got a pic of him skulking, but out of respect I won't post it. His face isn't visible anyways, but, still. I mean, I had some pretty tatted cholos walk by and give me a nod and thumbs up but some white collar dude...lol. Man has my perspective changed.
So, as I promised, here's a time lapse of my first wall art :)
And a selfie, of course :)
This experience was one of the coolest in my life. All the events that led up to this point, what it took to get here, so worth it. Now, I just gotta keep the momentum going!
Thanks for dropping by and checking out the story of my first piece of wall art. I hope you enjoyed my quick walk through the process, and, of course the final piece. As always, I'd love to hear what you think about it. Do you have any questions? I'm always happy to answer. Hope y'all have a great week!
Wessel
Previous posts:
My Creative Journey 47
My Creative Journey 46
My Creative Journey 45
My Creative Journey 44
My Creative Journey 43
My Creative Journey 42
My Creative Journey 41
My Creative Journey 40
My Creative Journey 39
My Creative Journey 38
My Creative Journey 36 + 37 + Watch me Paint! Ep. 16
My Creative Journey 35 + Watch me Paint! Ep. 15
My Creative Journey 33 + Watch me Paint! Ep. 14
My Creative Journey 32 + Watch me Paint! Ep. 13
My Creative Journey 31 + Watch me Draw! Ep. 7
My Creative Journey 30 + Watch me Paint! Ep. 12
My Creative Journey 29 + Watch me Draw! Ep. 06
My Creative Journey 28
My Creative Journey 27
My Creative Journey 26 + Watch me Paint! Ep. 11
My Creative Journey 25 + Watch me Draw! Ep. 05
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