June 01, 2006

Finished at Last

Finally we went last night to check over the mural, tidy up and pick up our materials. I can't believe it is finished at last. It really has been an epic and we have been working on it for nearly a year (in the evenings when we could). I am really pleased with the end result and I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed doing it. Its weird though because despite working on this I still have my painters block and find it hard to pick up one of the many blank canvases I have lying around the house. I will definitely have to work on this.

Posted by Maxine at 08:03 PM | Comments (5)

December 22, 2005

Mural on TV

Just an update on how things are going. There really has been Narnia fever here for a while, which has been great for us because the mural was included in the CS Lewis Festival tour and was also worthy of a news broadcast! This was shown on the 12th December and courtesy of my lovely futureboy of a husband, who captured and compressed it for me you can see it too!

Posted by Maxine at 01:04 AM | Comments (1)

December 06, 2005

Narnia Cards

As it is after midnight ( I am very tired!) and due to the popularity of these cards so far, unfortunately I don't have a photograph of the actual cards to show you. This is a bit of a crude image of what the cards are like, but hopefully you can get an idea from this.

Basically there are 6 different cards depicting various elements of the mural. They are mounted on an off white card, which is then sitting off the main card slightly, giving it a raised frame. Underneath each card is a relevant phrase form the book itself.

I don't have a payment facility set up yet but if anyone is interested in purchasing the cards just let me know via the comment field and I will sort something out. I am currently selling them for £2 each or £10 for the set. I will get a photograph of the actual cards up in a few days.

View larger image

Posted by Maxine at 12:15 AM | Comments (0)

November 22, 2005

Narnia Mural: Almost There!

It has certainly been a labour of love this project and after months of work we are finally nearing a close. Of course we always knew it had to be finished before the release of the film as it is part of the CS Lewis Festival here in freezing cold Belfast!

There are just of a couple of things to finish, including the wardrobe - which can't be seen in this picture. This is the most I can get into a frame at one time. When it is completely finished I will try my best to get an overall shot.

Just so you know we will also be producing Christmas cards based on the mural which will be for sale in the next couple of weeks.

Posted by Maxine at 03:15 PM | Comments (0)

October 17, 2005

CS Lewis Mural Progress

I have been meaning to keep more of a diary than I have managed on this mural. Partly to see the ongoing progress of it and partly to work out how long something like this actually takes. Its very hard to estimate the timescale of something like this. Mind you, we have had an open deadline, which means we could spend more time than is probably necessary - if that makes sense!

Well as you can see it is coming along nicely. Pictured above in action are myself, Susan and the Revd Christopher Woods. I Have to take more pictures of the kids working on it too. Its a great project to work on and I am really enjoying it, as well as it being a great experience. I totally want to paint murals all the time now, there is something really satisfying about working on that scale. Hopefully the pics will give you an idea of the size of wall and what we are trying to achieve. The two doors, we have incorporated as the wardrobe doors which is working wonderfully. In fact last time I looked in one of the doors (which is used for the drama supplies) I actually noticed a fur coat! How spooky is that? It just shows that its meant to be.

Posted by Maxine at 09:19 PM | Comments (2)

July 13, 2005

Mural

As well as an absolute scorcher (not very often you get such weather in this part of the world), another reason for me slacking off as far as this blog is concerned, is due to my latest project.

I was asked a few weeks ago if I would be interested in doing a mural for a local church and I have just started working on it. My friend Susan is also doing it alongside me - to be honest its that long since I have done anything like this that I felt more confident getting someone else involved, so we would be moral support for each other.

I am quite excited about it actually. We are doing a mural of 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe' in the church where CS Lewis was christened, so it has a lot of historical significance. In fact the building next to the church was his grandfathers house and he was bought up in a lovely 'fairy tale' looking house just around the corner from where I live.

We should hopefully be starting it the end of next week but we have a lot of work still to do - hence my lack of productivity with other things. We will be sketching the illustration onto the wall and then involving the kids (teenagers) from the church to help paint it. I would love to do more of this type of work.

Here is a picture of the wall - its not a great image but the room is very narrow so it was hard to get it all in. The doors in the room will become the doors of the wardrobe. The other pic is an initial sketch of what we are going to do, although it has already changed slightly. We will be documenting this project to help us with future ones.

Posted by Maxine at 07:47 PM | Comments (1)