Got A Wall? Will Paint... A Mural

Hard to capture all of the amazing details in this work when it's in a hallway, but you get the idea!

How would you feel about painting a mural? 

Well, sure, where do you want it to go?

In that area where students enter every morning. It would be nice for the families to see.

The whole hallway? Uh... Let me get on that (right now)!

I've sketched, designed, painted, and collaborated on many artworks but nothing to the scale of what faced me in the school side entrance. My curriculum specialist has nothing if not vision and this was the place to show our school culture. So I embarked on a massive mural project with just a few weeks left of school and lots of excited helpers.

Just getting started

First I sat down with my students and we talked about our school values. What is important to us? What are we working toward? What are we good at? The students brainstormed visuals and buzzwords to get us started. Then students got a blank paper roughly to scale of the wall where we would be working. Each person came up with a design idea to bring all of our thoughts together. Then we shared them, picked and chose what worked best from each design, and reassembled them into our final draft.

Taking shape!

I decided to sketch the design on the wall to manage the scale of the objects because we had such a long space and to unify the overall appearance. Then it was time to block in the major colors (blue, brown, and green for the sky, grass, and tree). After that the real fun came in adding details. A warm color pattern livens up the sun. Flowers dot the grass. Organic swirls playfully mimic tree bark a'la Klimt. Our school mascot, a charming little blue owl, is tucked up in the tree also.

Almost there

The best part was that we finished the mural just as school was finishing so we could celebrate all of our accomplishments that year and it welcomed students back the next.