Resilience

Acrylic on tyvek, reproduced on adhesive vinyl, 33'4" x 30'
2022, Oregon State Treasury Building, Salem
includes animals c) Steph Littlebird

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Inspiration

The new Treasury Building is a "resilient" green building and all the art they commissioned follows this theme. Coming during the pandemic, Oregon's forest fires and a community that seems broken, this project felt meaningful and timely. I began my design with burnt 'ghost trees' (white columns in the final) that mirror the structure of the stairwell and give the composition structure. To this I added supersize figures, based on my own photographs of Oregonians I admire. The people I think are resilient are mothers and grandmothers, farmers, immigrants, children, artists and Indigenous families, and my figures represent a portion of these. I am also grateful to artist Steph Littlebird (Chinook/Kalapuyan), who licensed her original animal designs and gave me freedom to weave them into the whole. Steph's art upped the vibrancy of my color scheme and inspired me to use more pattern in the background --see the mountain, tree, and wave shapes. I especially enjoyed the process of weaving and puzzling the different elements together with continuous lines and overlapping circles. This means you can look at the piece repeatedly and see different elements each time, as I feel when looking at the two paintings shown below -- fish by a Brazilian street artist, and the "Painting of Life" by Alex Beard. This secondary level of detail is a gift for the workers in the building, who may traverse the stairwell every day.

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process

Instead of spending days on scaffolding in this tight stairwall, I painted this mural at a quarter-size in my studio. Then I scanned it and handed it to my printer, who formatted and installed long sheets of adhesive vinyl. The level of detail remains stunning -- you'll see some pencil lines and drips shining through, and the large composition can be seen from outside, especially at night.

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