San Luis Obispo I Madonnari Feature Square--September 2007

We were greatly honored to be asked by the Children's Creative Project to create the feature square at this year's I Madonnari in San Luis Obispo. We are both graduates of Cal Poly SLO and love to visit the area. Choosing an image for a feature square has proven to be very difficult for us, and in this case we didn't decide until a week or two before the festival. The image is based on a watercolor painting by Joseph Bohler, a watercolor artist from Colorado. He painted his granddaughter Rebecca playing with his watercolors on their front porch.

This was the largest painting we've done so far: 14 ft. wide and 18 ft. tall (almost twice as large as the 12x12 square we did in Palo Alto three weeks before). It had its own inherent challenges in addition to the size: the paving in front of the San Luis Obispo mission is salt-finish concrete banded by strips of saltillo tile. The other artists in the square dealt with the concrete with us; we had a band of tile running across the center of the painting as well. While neither material is ideal for street painting, we managed.
 

Rebecca's face on Friday afternoon.

Wayne draws a pine tree--his specialty.

Wayne works on foliage and Cheryl paints the dress on saltillo tile.

Wayne works on foliage and Cheryl works on Rebecca's dress.

David paints the porch.

Cheryl works on Rebecca's dress on Saturday.

David, Cheryl and Wayne work on Saturday.

Cheryl and Wayne work on Saturday afternoon.

A quick photo break on Saturday for Wayne, Cheryl and David.

Wayne, Cheryl and David work on Saturday.

Wayne paints the water jar.

The painting at the end of the day on Saturday.

David sorts chalk back into the bins at the end of the day.

Wayne sorts chalk back into the bins at the end of the day.

Wayne adds highlights to the tree foliage.

The hat looked very large from the top of the painting.

Wayne works on the hair.

Cheryl and Wayne add highlights to the hair.

Cheryl and Wayne put highlights in Rebecca's hair.

Wayne adds some finishing touches to the foliage.

Cheryl and Wayne add finishing touches.

Photographers in the scissor lift take the official photos of the painting.

Cheryl and Wayne pose for the official photos.

The completed photo from the top of the scissor lift.

The original painting by Joseph Bohler.

< Previous Festival | Street Painting Index | Next Festival
Return to our homepage.