Here is the latest mural! I don’t have any recent pictures: this one was taken a couple of weeks ago, before the chickens (and a few other details) were added. Yes, chickens! The idea here is to illustrate what Kirby’s Farm Market offers for their wholesale customers. We wanted to avoid very typical imagery, and create something fun and eye catching. After struggling with a composition divided into three pieces by those metal bars, this is the solution I came up with. The chickens complete the effect because they are painted as a trompe l’oiel element, and they appear to be sitting ON the bar.
It has definitely been interesting so far, and I’m still in the middle of it. The first thing that struck me as being different about this project is the possibility of moving the surface whenever I wanted to – and often when I didn’t! This is my family’s market truck so every Thursday and Saturday it makes the trip into Rochester to the Public Market. This means that I only have Monday and Tuesday to work on it, since they load the truck on Wednesday and Friday night. Painting has been progressing steadily nonetheless and it is very close to finished. It should be done by July. One side effect of this situation is that the mural grows in pieces. It takes about one day to prep each section and then paint two of the fruits and vegetables.
The second thing that struck me as unique is it’s duplicity. Two sides! I was finishing up the first side, feeling that sense of satisfaction you get when you’re close to finishing up a big project. There were only a few details left to tie up. I walked over to turn off the lights and as I was walking back, I saw the other side. It seems so obvious, I’m just not used to painting a mural twice. The benefit is that I learned a few things painting it the first time, and the second time round gave opportunities for improvement.
If you live in the Rochester area, you can see the truck at stalls 49 and 51 in the A Shed at Rochester Public Market. And often at Kirby’s Farm Market in Brockport . Hopefully I will be able to post updated pics by the end of this week!