Nativity Painting 2016

Anne Marie and I painted this backdrop for The Festival of the Nativity. It went so much faster than last year's. That one, with all the outlines and complicated shading, took about three weeks. This one was done in three days. Whew! (This was a relief, as we're both pretty busy!).



We were given the image to enlarge and paint on the backdrop. I don't know who created it originally, but on the last day of painting I realized that the two camels on the ends are actually the same camel. We were laughing over how we didn't notice at first, even after tracing and painting both of them.

We had a little trouble when we used up some leftover black paint from last year and then started a new can, only to discover that the two blacks didn't quite match.  Anne Marie came up with some creative solutions so  we didn't have to completely go over everything.

The theme is "Star of Wonder, Star of Light."  Oooh, pretty!

Palette Knife Painting and La Bohème

It's not just sets, anymore--for La Bohème I got to paint a prop. The character of Marcello is an artist, and works on a painting of the red sea. The set designer gave me a sketch of big red waves on an ocean with a woman's face in it.  The canvas was small enough that I was able to work on it at home, up against the half-wall in the living room where we get pretty good light.



After getting this far I decided that it needed to be done with a palette knife. I've never done this before. I didn't even have a palette knife. I picked up a cheap plastic set.



I've discovered that I really enjoy palette knife painting. It's fast and bold, and makes fun textures. I was pretty happy with this, but Linda (the director) said that the face was too obvious, so I took it back home to tweak it a bit more.



In the opera lyrics, we're told that Marcello keeps trying to paint other things and then they turn into Musetta's face. Nobody told me this to begin with (I think I probably would have approached it a little differently), but it turned out all right. Linda was happy with it, anyway. It only has to look good from forty feet!



There was a lot of set painting to do, too.  We're back in the rehearsal space at the Armory. It's gone through some cosmetic changes, but of all the spaces that I've worked in it's the most familiar.



Tracing out big sandstone blocks. I made a foam board template.



Anne Marie came with me one day, and I put her to work painting seam lines on wood paneling.



I got a plastic stencil blank and made myself a brick stencil. When I arrived at the Rialto for load-in and there wasn't anything ready for me to paint on stage yet, I spent a few hours painting bricks out in the lobby.



I will remember this as definitely the most hectic and exhausting set construction that I've been through. Tony and Rosy retired and bought a house in Mexico, so Tony's carpentry role was filled by somebody else (who was familiar with the process but hadn't worked in that specific capacity), who found himself rather over his head and then got sick. So there was a lot of scrambling and everybody jumping in to help out, and lots of long hours. This pic was taken on the day of dress rehearsal. Now, we've never been completely finished before dress rehearsal, but we've never been this far behind. It was crazy.



Kevin and Royce paint window mullions.  Everyone was super helpful.



I added some smoke damage to the bricks above the fire place. That turned out really well. (I probably would have done more if I'd had time!)  The set is reversible--the back side is one big long stretch of sandstone blocks, which I never did get a picture of, since it was always on the back side and the lighting was horrible, but that's what I spent the most time on. Lots of ladder work, at the end. On opening night I was at the theater for about eight hours, painting like crazy. And then I went home and crashed.

In the past I understand that the opera did run for two weekends, but since I've started it's always been just final dress rehearsal Wednesday, opening night Friday, and matinee Sunday. This year they decided to try doing two weekends again, so we had final dress Thursday, opening night Saturday, and then two more performances the following Friday and Sunday. And since Doug has evening class this quarter (again), I begged tickets for Friday instead of final dress. As it turned out, having a week to recover in between made a huge difference. I was not completely wiped out the next day. So it seems it's not the late night and the excitement and the Rialto's uncomfortable seats that are so exhausting, it's the week of painting before that. Whew!



I went with Anne Marie and Erica and we had a great time. None of us had ever seen La Bohème before. I've seen it described as one of the most beloved operas, which I didn't quite get--we found the plot a bit thin--but the music was sublime and the performers truly amazing.

Nativity Painting

I finish one painting project and start another. This was for the Festival of the Nativity at the stake center, this year's theme being "Through a Child's Eyes."



Karen Hemming sent me a picture back in October and asked if I could paint it. I said, "Sure!" It sounded like fun. It looked like a fairly simple image.



Doug was able to check out a laptop and projector from school, so we used that to trace the image onto plywood. Definitely a time-saver! This was taken after a few days of painting. As it turns out, the image is not as simple as it looks. There's a lot of shading. The whole thing took about three weeks.



I thought it would be fun to involve Kate, so I told her I would save the donkey hooves for her to do. I took a break over Thanksgiving, and then Saturday morning we went hoof painting.



She enjoyed it so much that she also did the donkey's eye and nostril (which I did have to touch up, but I'm sure it was a positive experience!)



Anne Marie had some free time on Monday and spent a few hours helping me do outlines. She is awesome. (She probably saved me a day of work.)



The light on the stage was not great. Outlines are tedious. Squinting does not help.



Painting with a buddy is more fun! I got us some posole for lunch, and we sat on my drop cloth and had a posole picnic. It was fabulous. 



While the painting was taking shape on the stage, the rest of the church was transforming into a Christmas wonderland. I finally finished up on Thursday, the day before the festival opened.  I was confident that I didn't have much left to do, so I was just enjoying  being there, taking my time getting nice clean edges, and listening to the Jenny Oaks Baker Christmas Pandora channel on Karen's phone. Kind of a zen experience. 



Finishing up the star! Laura Call came in to volunteer, and I got her to take a photo for me. The lighting turned out pretty cool in this one!  



Setting up the painting at the front of the stage. They used some of the arches from Savior of the World, which I painted ten years ago. (Elsewhere they also used the rocks that I painted for Pirates of Penzance. Everything gets reused!) It looks bigger like this, somehow. 



Grandma Mary came up to see us, and we all went to the festival together. Kate got to tell a few people that she painted the donkey hooves.



It's fun to see all the different nativities. I liked the style of this one.



Everything is so bright and pretty!

People sometimes ask me how I feel about volunteering so much time painting for church projects. I figure it's my consecration.  It is a lot of work, and not always convenient, but it's a blessing for me and for others.  The experience is always good.

Portrait Attempt (Acrylic)

Dawn, who got two pencil drawings last year, asked if I could paint her. I told her I wasn't sure how it would come out, but I was willing to give it a shot. I've been doing pencil drawings for years, and I've painted a few things (giraffes, Hogwarts....) but my non-pencil portrait experience has been pretty limited.

I'm reasonably happy with how it turned out. I'd say the hardest thing was trying to match the skin tones. And then just deciding how much attention to pay to the background. (I do like the flowers on the left. Those came out nicely.) Also, no one should ever have to paint teeth on their first attempt. So, all in all, not fabulous, but I'm not completely put off portrait painting for eternity. I'd like to give it a try again sometime, with a better photo. Something with higher resolution and more interesting lighting. After all those other projects on my list.

Sound of Music sets

I've been painting for The Sound of Music--this year's production of the Tacoma Multi-Stake Cultural Arts Committee.  We've been excited about this since it was announced last year.  The powers that be agreed to roll in the budget from two other productions (A Christmas Carol did not happen this last December) so they could pay for the rights, and they really pulled out all the stops.



All the planning and preparation takes quite a while, of course, but they only get two weeks before opening night to lock up the gym and keep everybody else out. During those two weeks the place is a madhouse.



Patrick came and talked to me about sets a few weeks ahead of time, so I was able to start putting together some ideas.  This is the sketch I came up with for the rear of the house. 



I took a couple of days to draft the design onto the panels (lots of measuring and marking), and then started painting. Patrick came up with this really cool system where he had some tracks on the stage and then panels that slid into the tracks. The panels were wood frames with canvas drop cloths stretched over them, which was not an ideal surface for painting, but we made it work.



I had a lot of help with filling in areas of color, so I could focus on details and shading. And Anne Marie painted a lot of the window bars for me, which was a huge help. (So nice to have a friend with a steady hand... I don't think I would have trusted anyone else to do those!)



Anne Marie touching up abbey windows. (The windows were based on this photo, simplified a bit). The abbey walls and the house background color were both mistints that Patrick got for free. Can't beat that!



I was thinking of how I got a glowy effect on some of the windows in the Hogwarts mural, so I tried going for a similar look. I think it worked--it did look pretty cool from the audience!



Anne Marie on stage (she was painting the top track to blend in with the black curtains).   You can see one of the house panels in the background.



Patrick built this mountain over the orchestra. (This was one of the first things he told me about--"I'm going to make a mountain!"--but he didn't get to actually put it together until a few days before the play.)



Mixing up mountain color (we use what we have!)



Patrick put on the base coat.



I painted the mountain in less than two hours, the morning of opening night. It was a rush job. Not what I would have liked, but I got it done!



Kate and I went to the Saturday matinee. I gave her a little bit of background while we were waiting for it to start--"Okay, do you know what a nazi is, and do you know what a nun is?"  She said she enjoyed it.  I'd never seen the stage version before--it is a bit different from the movie.  (The orchestra was a little rocky, but everyone did a really great job.)



The nuns' music was really gorgeous! The whole thing was just lovely.  It's so cool to put in all those hours and then see it all come together.

I was a little bummed about not getting picked for the Tacoma Murals Project (I made the initial selection process and got onto their artist roster, but wasn't chosen for one of the six mural sites)--but honestly, I don't think there's any way I could have done both at the same time. And a few days before opening night I got an email from the Tacoma Opera, asking me to come back and paint for their February and April productions this next year. I was walking around with a big grin all evening. It's just so fun.

There's still time to catch the show! Two more weekends!