willow charcoal – Paper Opera

The Vineyard Church here in Springfield, MO wanted a mural for their children’s ministry, and I am always looking for ways to use my art as ministry since that is my gifting.

Josh, one of the pastors, wanted a tree with the fruit of the spirit. In the New Living Translation (NLT) Bible, Galatians 5:18-25 says “But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses. When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God. But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives.”

I was actually inspired from the Harry Potter movie series.

After looking at some pictures of the “Black Family Tree,” I sketched up this drawing.

I brought the mural painting supplies and kept them in a closet at the church while I worked. I used pencils, ruler, willow charcoal, eraser, paint brushes, Velspar house paint samples, acrylic paint (Winsor & Newton Galleria: Burnt Umber, Yellow Ochre, Mars Black, Cadmium Yellow Medium Hue, and Pale Umber. Golden: Cadmium Red Medium Hue and Burnt Sienna. Liquitex Basics: Raw Sienna. Liquitex: Raw Umber. Grumbacher Academy: Titanium White and Burnt Sienna), brushes, soap, latex gloves, paper towels, palette knife, plastic cups, baking pans, palette paper, painters, Masters Hand Soap, a tarp, ladder, and diaper bag.

I drew up the top and bottom borders with a ruler and pencil. The projector I use sometimes was too small to cover such a large area. So, I just freehanded the mural using willow charcoal.

I then printed out copies of the sketch and used inktense pencils to decide the color scheme for the mural.

I used Velspar house paint samples from Lowes to paint all of the mural except for the scenes with the people, which I used acrylic paint. It took three to five coats of the house paint for some colors to cover the wall.

A couple of my artsy/artist friends Kara, Lindsay, and Stashia came to help me paint while our kids had a playdate (now that’s multitasking at its finest). And of course M jumped in a bit to help paint as well.

E loved the scene depicting self-control. She kept pointing to the cupcake saying “cupcake” and then pretend eating it with her pincher fingers and making “mmm” noises.

M and our daughter E would go with me most days and sometimes my friend Lacy from Gallery Gal would also meet me because she was painting the Lord’s Prayer on another wall. It took me about three months to complete (going about three times a week for roughly one hour each session).

Hopefully this mural will not only make the space more fun and enjoyable for the kids, but it will also make it easy for them to learn the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

When I was on the missions trip with Grace Church serving the Livada Orphan Care ministry in Romania, the beauty of the country inspired me.

During one of my morning quiet times with God, I felt like He gave me the idea to paint scenes from Romania to raise money for orphan child sponsorship. It would serve a double purpose to paint the scenes. On one hand, someone would purchase the painting for the suggested donation price or fundraiser auction. On the back end, when the said person looks at the painting, they are encouraged to pray for Livada and the orphans in Romania.

I was originally going to purchase a large canvas roll and stretchers and stretch my own canvas. Though time consuming, stretching canvas is much cheaper than purchasing pre-stretched canvas…unless there is some sort of deal.

On a random day of the week as I was driving home from work, I had a God moment and turned into Michaels. They did indeed have one of these “deals.” There was buy 3 canvas for the price of 1, so I got 15 canvas for the price of 5, which was around $50.

I mixed gesso with acrylic paint and covered each of the canvas. I like to add a color to the white gesso to create a light or mid-tone, so that when I paint I can add lights and darks.

After the canvases dried, I sketched (from photographs) each of the images using willow charcoal. Because I am working with so many images and mostly landscapes I had to have a way of organizing them. I created a list numbering and naming each piece with the canvas size. I put the names on the back of the canvas on the stretcher bar and also on the photograph source.