Students can now mix paint to match the colors they chose. They might need lots of help getting the colors close to one another. Mix a lot of each color and keep the paint in containers with lids, so that you can maintain consistent colors throughout the project. You can have students label each section of the image with a certain number, and match that number to a color, paint-by-numbers style. Not very inspiring, but definitely a good way to keep things coordinated with lots of people working on the same thing.
Before they start painting, discuss with students the ideas behind complementary and contrasting colors. If the mural design is complicated and requires a large palette, you might need to label each section with a different number, and assign that number to a paint batch. With this mural, we had a small enough class and simple enough design to allow students to decide on colors along the way.
step six: paint!
This step is pretty self-explanatory, but a good excuse to post a photo.
step seven: add details
Maybe you had some drawings that you didn't end up using for the larger plan, but you find that you can now use some of those images as smaller details. Here is one student adding a bird based on tracings we made.
step 8: touch up
This should be done by a teacher or a skilled hand. Smooth edges, add another layer if paint is thin in any area. Below is the progress of our mural. We are somewhere between the Painting and Touch Up stages. The two panels are going to be installed between windows in our studio.
Our themes were Growth & Community.
step 9: mural unveiling/celebration
We are going to unveil our mural at the end-of-term celebration for our center on Saturday. For an outdoor mural, having a big celebration with food and music, where the artists have a chance to talk about the mural, is crucial to letting the neighborhood feel pride and ownership over the public artwork.
