Bringing Wynwood to campus

Wynwood is an art district of Miami that has become synonymous with artistically painted walls. Not a surface is left uncovered by art. Looking around campus at the new and old construction, the art club got itchy to add some designs. We painted rocks, banners for the gym, and then this spring we christened the baseball dugout with our own geometric school color design. Three designs were submitted to the athletic department, and this is the one that won out over the other two.

Natali and Michi with the vision

Angel (really!) in the Maintenance Department prepared the wall for us. We took 3 hours and 7 rolls of tape to prep before being able to paint!

This is the third student mural I have facilitated in my 8 years at Palmer. It brings me greatjoy to see the ownership and pride that develops in the students as they showcase their talents to the campus in a big way. I barely lifted a finger, except to hand them some pizza!

We painted through a home game and removed all the tape after 7 hours of work!

Wynwood mural painters 2018

Right before Miami Art week and Basel (December 4-9) comes to town, the streets of Miami's arts district get a whole new coat of paint. I was proud to be a part of all that last Saturday. Across the North Miami Avenue from me was Denise Charles. She was manifesting the green theme. Down the block was Gabriela Mino. She has a business making cute bags for kids.

Other artists at work last Saturday for the Parkyourartwynwood2018 included SiegelINK, Erick Morell, Elena Montijo and Marlet Lopez.

Meanwhile by noon, when the sunlight was skipping across the street towards me, I was only this far!
See the cute little cooler Miami Parking Authority gave us? It was filled with ice cold water bottles and snacks. A life saver!

The Blank Canvas

Some towns have artists paint fiberglass cows, some paint peacocks or guitars. Miami has artists paint the parking meters. We are very much attached to our cars here! (There's very little in public transportation)
So Saturday morning, before the light even cracked the pavement, I found myself staring down the slick primed surfaces of this Miami parking Authority machine. My vine charcoal was useless in sketching out my designs... I took my inspiration from one of the newly completed, and one of my favorite, swooping highways near the airport, the intersections of 836 and 826.

Once I had it fairly well planned on my brown paper, I taped it up to check the scale. The challenging trick was getting the highways to match up after wrapping 360 degrees! You would have thought I had it all planned ahead of time, but Time ran away and I only got the notification of the privilege 7 days earlier.

Seventy two artists submitted designs for the contest. Seven were chosen. Beefree Media was running the show. I was thrilled to be a part of the live painting project once again. My whole life I have struggled with shyness, but give me a brush and some paint, and I can put on a show! It's what I love to do. And I have become pretty darn fast- one of the quickest draws in the market, maybe. (haha) I thought I'd be done by noon.

Public art project in Miami Wynwoo

Getting ready to paint on the streets of the city. #parkyourartwynwood #miamiparking.com

I'm a Park Your Art Wynwood Winner!!!

So happy to be chosen to paint another (did it last year) Miami Parking Authority parking meter station in Wynwood, Miami's mural covered district, this weekend. Park your art is in it's 4th annual family canvas event. They have art supplies and projects for all ages to participate in a day of creativity and color.
Inspired by the intersection of highways 836 and 826 near the airport, I will be out at the curb with my paints pulling off a four sided mural of Miami highways at night. Wish me luck!

Spooky Infirmary Door

Happy Halloween all you goblins and ghosts!  I had some fun creating a door mural for the school nurse's office. A Booboo ghost with a Mummy nurse sporting a giant syringe of love. Our nurse has to be one of the hardest workers on campus seeing over 65 students a day!

Love painting quick like this on brown paper... just black and white and a little red!

That makes FIVE murals at the Yoga Studio

Peter, theyogawarrior.org, has commissioned me for 5 murals since 2013.
I started outside on the side of the house with a painting of him in warrior pose at the sea.

Then I painted the OM symbol inside, on the large studio-facing wall.

I remember chanting Om while I did it! It was a fun vibration to paint with.
Then, I collaborated with Michael for the next two murals... the body chakras, and a large Buddha head.

The giant Buddha head was done in oil, applied and wiped off.

And today... a Lotus on the backboard! It is mostly spray paint with a little brush work.

Miami Basel in sight on horizon

The Guernica seen through carnival fun mirrors is ...like the Miami Basel hype. There is a rumble through the artist studios. Where is the work? Who has the work? What is to be said? How much time do we have? Who has the money? When? And of course... though many try not to ask it, Why?

The show goes on

This weekend the junior thespians are dominating the stage with a wonderful and rich production of Seussical:the Musical Jr.!!! I had a lot of fun working on the stage- it really turned out wonderfully.

After painting the stage floor, John Baldwin brought in the sets and special effect lights.

But really- the kids, the actors, stole the show! they reminded me of my own childhood doing small productions on the summer lawn, and also I think of my dramatically inclined nieces... (what are they up to these days?)

I love hanging out and collaborating with theater people!

Wynwood is a little thin on the magic this year

Took my annual bike ride through Wynwood to see all the pre-Basel artists at work on the streets. Last year this time the place was hopping. Not so, this year. There were a few artists at work, more women than before, but many walls were behind fences and being prepped for "live action painting parties". Some walls were out and out selling... directing you to a gallery down the road, or advertizing a new brand of Italian spray paint.

Selling his brand of paint

Tati Suarez, a local girl and PTS grad!

New restaurant shout-out

yea, that's how I feel

What is he doing?

What was striking was all the construction going on. There is building everywhere. Empty spaces are being refurbished, and new buildings are squeezing in between lots. Most of the cherry picker lifts were for the construction, not the painters! The (over) development is getting crazy. I hear rents have skyrocketed. Artists and galleries serious about making a living have moved away.

There is a woman painting behind that fence

Unfortunately, I got a roofing nail in my tire crossing Miami avenue., aka Tony Goldman Way.

Mural from years past

Old offering...we loved how the tree and the wall had the same palette, a blending of art/city/nature.

Clinton Shepherd in Clewiston

Some fabulous murals in the Clewiston Inn's bar! Clinton Shepherd (1888-1975), the mural painter, was born in DesMoines Iowa. He studied some at the Wisconsin-Kansas City University but dropped out with his brother in 1906 to go live with the Crow Indians. ( I can just imagine what their mother went through). Finally in 1910 he attended the Chicago Art Institute to study painting. When WWI came along he enlisted and was a bugle boy. After the war he worked as an illustrator in NYC for magazines such as Collier's, The Saturday Evening Post, and Woman's World. As glossy magazines lost advertisement in the depression, Shepherd moved to Westport Connecticut and took up sculpting and painted covers for pulp fiction books.

In 1935 he moved to West Palm Beach Florida and taught at Barry University. He also became director of the Norton Gallery School of Art in Palm Beach. He died after a heart attack at his easel when he was 87 years old. (A fine way to go!)
He painted the murals for the Clewiston Inn in the 1940's. They were painted in his studio on linen and then installed like wall paper. With his careful planning, the art wraps around the interior of the room, framing the doors and windows with indigenous wildlife of the Everglades.
It was wonderful to sit among the creatures in the flora and take note of what animals still exist and what we may have seen in our travels. It felt truly like a time capsule. The bar room is a gem and worth a stop to see. It is in great condition because it has not been open to the public and is only open for the guests of the hotel.
Only a little older than Howard Simon, an artist I helped install an exhibition for last summer at the horsebarn, Shepherd has some of the same stylistic tendencies but would have just missed Simon in NY. I wonder if they knew of each other...

These walls are reserved and waiting for action

All over Wynwood Miami, walls are being measured, taped off, guarded and staked. While the muralists eye them from across the street, their assistants or men with truck beds loaded with compressors hire themselves out to do the prep work. Lifts and wheeled ladders can be seen down every street. There are carts and crates of paint cans on the sidewalks. Tempera bottles crushed in the gutters. Friends park awkwardly and open their trunks, casually exposing coolers of beers. Pedestrian gawkers walk down the middle of the roads. Music plays. Police cruisers park in the shade on the meridian of NW 5th avenue.
All work seems slow, and waiting, timing itself to meet the rush of the crowd of art lovers here for the Basel Convention center and the 23 satellite fairs, with simultaneous orgy of musical events and gastronomic pop up sensations. These painters want to be caught in the act!

This artist has been painting this same section of the wall for the last four years. Every year it is a new image. He has been painting walls since the 1980's and comments on how much has changed. When he started...

 

he was part of a gang and he risked his life painting walls. Now he has been invited to paint the very walls he would have been arrested or shot at before. The change serves him fine. He has aged and has kids now. The image this year is inspired by a hero from his kid's Latino literature. Though certainly friendly and forthright, he is not waiting to paint for an audience. He has to be home by the end of the day, and yet he has another wall to paint around the corner that is being prepped ahead for him.

The mural above is a half day's work. It can be seen by highway 95 (northbound).