Zach Curtis Comes Back To Lafayette

Last fall Zach Curtis came to Lafayette and painted the Three Great Men mural on Main Street. A couple of months ago I got word that Zach was going to come back to town to paint a mural of Amelia Earhart. I was very excited to see this process again. I am fascinated by it. The whole thing seems so easy for the artist, but there is a reason Zach gets paid to go from town to town. He is very good at what he does. This year I knew that I would miss some time during the process because of a softball tournament, but I set out to document the mural again. I love telling the whole story of the paint going on the wall. Below are a few little stories that I liked from the week that I saw Zach painting.

Starting Things Off

The mural process is a fun thing to document. This was a plain cinderblock wall when things started off. The first step was to paint it white as a primer to get some paint on the wall. Then Zach came in and painted the wall some of the base colors of his design. I loved this little moment as those base colors started to come together in the middle.

Life Goes On

I love this photo because there is something cool happening around the corner, but both of these people at the coffee shop are on their devices. While I thought that this process was cool. People were coming by all of the time doing whatever they do everyday to make a living. It was fun to try and include a little bit of that in my photo story. This might have been my favorite example of that.

Getting The Sketch On The Wall

One of the things that is always most amazing to me during this process is seeing the sketch go up on the wall. A grid goes up first, and then Zach does his magic sketching the elements of the mural onto the wall. I had to leave town this time so I missed most of the sketch work, but it was very cool to see Amelia start to take shape.

Quick Progress

One thing about these murals is that the progress is quick when the weather cooperates. I missed two days of the mural while at a travel softball tournament and I couldn’t wait to see what I missed on Sunday afternoon. Zach had really started to bring the mural to life while I was away. The biggest portrait on the wall was this one of Amelia. You can see it nearly all the way down Main Street, and it is the centerpiece of the mural even if it is off to the side. I was lucky enough to see him put the finishing touches on that part of the mural.

Breaking The Drone Out

I don’t fly the drone much anymore. Most of what I want to photograph in the area is in a restricted zone so it doesn’t make much sense to fly it around her most of the time. For a project like this one though I was well below the tops of the buildings and the drone was a great tool to allow me to make all of the photos that I couldn’t make from the ground. The drone allows me to make photos like the one above that I really like. Most of the time I try to think graphically with my drone photos. I love these types of photos that bring you up to the level of the artist. Most of what Zach did that was amazing was above my head. The drone gives me another option to make photos with.

Special Guests

One morning while arriving at the wall Zach told me that he had just talked to Amelia Earhart. I immediately worried that his mask was not functioning properly and he had taken in too many paint fumes. I found out that Audrey Johnson was around the corner dressed as Amelia. John Purdue soon made his way to the wall and we had a couple of time travelers there to see the paint go on the wall.

Amelia Looks At Her Mural

Audrey was at the wall to film bits for a documentary about the mural. I spent most of that time trying to stay out of the shots that they had set up. I had one goal while they were filming though. I wanted a photo like this one of Amelia watching Zach paint. I kept moving hoping that the scene would lead to this photo, and luckily it did.  I really like how this turned out.

The View From The Stairs

This first thing that I saw when I found the alley were the mural was to go up was the staircase on the right side. It leads to the apartments above the businesses, but I knew that I would use it to make photos all week. It gave me another option to make photos from. The drone is nice for the things above my head, but sometimes you want a camera in your hand. The stairs allowed that to happen. I feel spoiled after this wall. I will want staircases at all of the murals that I photograph from now on.

The Sun Will Come Out

The early part of this mural seemed to be determined by rain more than anything else. From that point on I tried to include the sun in my photos when I could. Every morning just before the sun came over the building I had a little bit of time to play with the sun to bring it into my gallery.

Dedication Day

Dedication day is always a fun day. You get to see all of the people that made the mural possible. I made most of my photos on the day from the ground before running to my car for the drone to make this photo of the event from above. You can see Amelia Earhart and John Purdue leading the crowd in song with Zach in the back photographing the event.

Lucking Into A Photo

Zach put his iPad down with the paint cans for a second to talk to some fans that had stopped to see him work. As I walked by I saw the black screen was reflecting the wall. I moved over to put part of the mural into the right spot and made this photo. It is one of my favorite photos from the entire job. It is not my normal photo, but I will take the little bit of luck that helped me make it.

Making Memories

As I have said a few times already the rain was a story of the mural early on. The weather put Zach behind a bit so he had to really work to try and stay on time with the project. Even with that added pressure he still took the time to let local kids put some paint on the wall. He showed them the techniques, and then let them make memories that will last for a long time. Every time that they walk by this wall now they will see the portion that they helped paint.

Working The Cans In

I tried to work the cans into my photos during the week. The camera is my tool in the same way that the spray can is Zach’s. I kept trying to get the cans into photos any way that I could. Here they help hide some the the things on the ground so that we can focus on Zach on the wall.

Adding Some Local Flavor In My Photos

When I could I tried to include local businesses in my photos. This one from inside of one of the local businesses Scout is one of my favorites from the week.

Taking All Influences

As a photographer I have a weird range of influences that I draw on for my work. Whenever I do things like this Joel Sartore always comes to mind. I try to think like him. A week or so ago I found an old photo story by Alex Martin who used to work for the local paper. He documented a local shoe shop in their day to day work. That was really inspiring for me. With my drone photography I kept thinking of Pete Souza while in the air. He has a great photo of someone cleaning the Lincoln Monument. Photos like this one are my homage to that great photo.

Scale

You can make a  photo of a mural, but it can be hard to show scale. From time to time I have tried to put Zach up against his work to show the scale of what he has done. This is one of the smaller versions of Amelia that is on the wall, but as you can see it is still pretty big. I haven’t done much of this kind of photography, but every wall teaches me something new.

Showing The Scene

When Zach was here last fall he was in a tight alley which made photography even harder. This wall had a little more space so I made sure to document the job site throughout the process. All of the barriers seem kind of silly now, but they were part of the job for a little over a week.

Now What?

The mural is done. For the last week or so I have made a point to check in on Zach from time to time while he is working. It is thrilling for me to try and come up with new ideas every day. I have had days where I doubted if I could on the way into town only to come up with something on the fly while on the job. I really love this process. The next step with the mural now is to document everyday life around it. That is a pretty good long term project that will be fun to fulfill. I am sure that I have missed stories while writing this. It has been a long few days and stories that I wanted to tell will probably come to me as soon as I hit publish. For now you can check out the gallery that I made of the wall going up here. If you made it this far thanks for reading. This week there is no week in sports so I get to drone on about this mural for far too long today.