Painting The Tippecanoe County Public Library

The hardest wall by far to cover during the festival was the wall by Hiero Veiga on the Tippecanoe County Public Library. Without a drone all of the work was very high for me. I tried some long lens photography from fairly far away that brought me in a little closer to Hiero doing his thing. This mural might see the most traffic of all of them that were painted during the festival. It is also the one with the most color on it. From day one I had the thought that there will be an accident on South Street from someone looking at this work of art.

Patience On The Job

One of the fun things about the way that Hiero painted his wall was that he came into it with a plan, but was very open to changing things up as he went along. He talked to people in the area as well as the other artists before coming up with his final concept. This was one of my favorite photos from the festival as it shows Hiero under his wall coming up with his design. I only talked to him for a few minutes, but I learned a lot about his art and process in that time. I think it was this talk that inspired me to dive a little deeper into this project.

The In Between Moments

Because I couldn’t get close to Hiero on the ground while he was painting I tried to make a lot more photos of him while he was on the ground if I could. Here he looks over all of the paint that was there for him to pick out what he needed when he was up on the lift. While watching Hiero work I also found some great photos of the old Red Crown Museum next to the library.

Framing It Up

Because I didn’t have great access to Hiero I was forced to really try to make different photos of him painting. You can only make so many different photos from the ground. The Red Crown Museum gave me a few framing options that were fun to use. This old window was my favorite of those. When you are making mural photos for two straight weeks you have to really try to make something different each day.

The Doodle Grid

This was my first time watching artists paint murals for the most part. Going into it I had just watched one local artist paint a freehand mural. I had no idea what a doodle grid was going into it, and when I saw the one that Hiero had put on the wall on the first day I thought that it was his idea for the wall. To be honest I think that doodle grid colored in with vibrant colors could have been awesome. Of course when it was all said and done I found out the doodle grid was a way for the artist to reference the wall and make it easier to paint.