The Making of the St. Vincent de Paul of the Redwoods Mural
Working on the first six panels in my specially converted living room to home studio. Photo by Rocky Arroyo.
This week I completed the largest, most detailed and ambitious mural I’ve painted to date. Numerically speaking, the mural took me over 2 months and nearly 200 hours to paint 52 portraits that span across a 29’ x 20’ wall, divided into 16 separate 8’ x 4’ panels. In less concretely measurable ways, this project taught me a great deal about painting, endurance, and the dynamic ways all lives are intertwined and can enrich and uplift one another within their communities.
Close-up of St. Vincent’s eyes, photo by Rocky Arroyo
I was approached by staff of the St. Vincent de Paul of the Redwoods mid-brush stroke, painting Hairy Garcia on a building catty corner to theirs, separated by a large parking lot (where the previously standing building had allegedly burnt down)and a field of overgrown weeds and wind blown refuse. They offered for me to check out the wall behind their kitchen and services building behind the lot, which they hoped to transform from the currently peeling wall of aged white paint to a mural celebrating their many years of community service and the individuals who marked it.
Me reaching for a drumstick after applying the final clear coat to the mural. Photo credit: Grayson Fordyce.
I gladly accepted the challenge of documenting the broad range of services, clientele and devoted individuals who have served food, provided clothes, shelter, shower services and community resources to the city of Eureka, CA, for the past almost 50 years. Through the design process, I gathered references of the seemingly infinite volunteers and treasured board members from the organization’s fb page and framed photos that line the walls of the dining hall. It was challenging to fit in as many beloved members and volunteers as possible, not to mention the many clients of the services themselves. Eventually, I arrived at a densely packed composition that seemed to satisfy members of the organization by depicting the essence of the ever turning cycles of meal service, cooking and breaking bread that St. Vincent’s is marked by.
I created a montage from both photo and sketched elements to build the composition (above), and then transferred it to a more 1”:1’ ratio drawing (below).
Final to-scale mural plans captured by Rocky Arroyo
Because the proposed wall was in various stages of decay and needed significant renovation to become a sturdy substrate, I advocated to paint the mural on fresh sheets of plywood in 16 panels. Each panel is 8’ x 4’, and fit the wall with two rows of eight panels each. For the first time ever, I was able to paint a mural from home, which served the project in several ways. Because the design was so complex and intricate, it was helpful to be able to paint the works on the ground, as opposed to on a ladder or scaffolding. I was also able to avoid the Pacific Northwest winter rainstorms, and work longer into the mural season than I otherwise could have.
Progress pic captured by: Rocky Arroyo
It took 2 months to paint my way across the 29’ x 20’ mural, and to develop 52 individual portraits throughout it. I worked in stages of 4-6 panels at a time, and in doing so effectually took over the living room, dining room and porches with the assemblage of large boards. This transformation from home to studio was met with astonishingly little complaint from my fiancee Gray, even though he now had to hop nimbly around and across the panels on his way to morning coffee, and avoid the wet palettes strewn across the floor on his way to bed.
My puppy Huxley kept me company through the long days and nights working on this project. There was only one incident of him tracking little paint spattered puppy paw prints across the works…he figured out it was an off limits zone after that.
Adding layers to Sgt. LeFrance’s forehead in this mid-paint moment captured by my partner Gray Fordyce.
Each character was a unique experience to paint, and I contemplated their lives, families, experiences and thoughts as they emerged. It is a strangely intimate thing, painting portraits of strangers, especially when the faces themselves are 2 feet tall or more, larger than life and closer than I’d ever stand in person. It’s something special to document someone in one passing moment from their full and dynamic lives, a weighted task to capture something of their whole nature in a fleeting glimpse. Some faces emerge more readily than others, some have to be coaxed and conversed with first.
Over the week that I hung the panels on the wall itself, I learned more about each of these legendary (and in some cases, nearly mystical) characters from the head chef MaryLee Price (depicted in a tie die shirt in the front right portion of the mural) and friends of St. Vincent who hang out in the alley after lunch. It was a pleasant surprise to me that nearly everyone in the piece was identifiable by both staff/volunteers and clientele of the kitchen. It was fun to watch passersby point out one by one every individual in the mural, often with glee or giggles, and see their mixed reactions to my documentation of their friends and community.
In-progress look at a couple panels, photo by me.
J.D, the man pictured below, was instantly recognized by all parties, and I was told repeatedly that he would be happy to know he was painted so prominently in the piece. I was still anxious to see his reaction, however, because I hadn’t known his identity at the time I painted him, and hadn’t gotten permission to use his image in a public work. After the mural was hung, he came by and I got to see for myself his reaction. It was as promised, enthusiastic and goofy, he told me that their were other paintings of him out there, one that even hung in a local museum.
Close up of JD, local Eureka community member/client of St. Vincent’s. Pic by Rocky Arroyo
I learned that the lady third from the top left, with the flaming red hair and infectious smile, was a welder on ship engines during WWII—a real life Rosie the Riveter. She lived to be 103, and volunteered at St. Vincent’s for over 30 years until she passed. Beside her is Father Mike Cloney, a local pastor who started volunteering at St. Vincent’s in 1964. The woman to his right, Mary Ivanvich, was MaryLee’s elementary school lunch lady years before they took up arms together serving food to those in need.
In-progress capture of the aforementioned three, with my slippered foot for scale.
Something that hadn’t occurred to me until after I worked through this mural, is how rare it is to see public art depicting the very people who enjoy and appreciate it most— the people living and hanging out on the street itself. It felt important to record their lives and honor them though this painted immortalization, paying tribute to the people who appreciate the brightening of their surroundings most. It was brought to my attention that the man at the front of the food line, wearing the yellowish shirt in the third panel from the left, died while I was working on the piece. Mixed stories say that he died walking into a shelter on Christmas Day or that he was stabbed several days after. Either way, Timmy is now permanently blazoned onto this collective memory mural. I hope he would’ve wanted to be.
Sipping some water with the folks at the table. Pic by Gray Fordyce
The actual hanging of the mural was a process all to itself, and was made possible by the assistance of a literal total stranger-passerby-turned-collaborator: Vincent “Captain Wade”. Vincent had driven past me on hwy 101 while I was working on Hairy Garcia (https://lostcoastoutpost.com/2021/aug/7/behold-hairy-garcia-new-eureka-mural-highway-101-s/) and offered generously the use of his bucket truck, should I ever need to reach areas of a wall that are unreachable through ladder or lift. I took him up on his offer for the St. Vincent mural, and so ensued an awesome weekend of teamwork between he, my partner Gray, local documentary filmmaker and friend of St. Vincent’s Laura Montagna, and Bob Santilli of the organization.
Vincent leaning over the roof of the building drilling screws into the panels, pic by me.
I drove the truck while Vincent drilled the top line of screws while Gray hoisted up the panels and drilled the bottom line of screws.
The week after the installation of the mural, I touched up the piece and replaced/added several additional portraits. At the end of the week, St. Vincent’s held a mural unveiling event that we invited as many people included in the mural as possible, along with the Eureka town mayor Susan Seaman and local news crews. It was wonderful to get to meet some of the characters I’d painted and witness their joy at seeing themselves on the wall. Below are some photos of the party and members of the mural in person.
Group photo of some of the members of St.Vincent’s volunteer and board depicted in the mural. From left to right, Larry Alexander (posing below his portrait), MaryLee Price (painted in tie-dye shirt in the front row), Benjamin (playing guitar in the top back row of mural towards the right side), Sargent LaFrance of Eureka PD (above the man with the red shirt and to the right of the pit bull on the top right), Father Mike Cloney (fourth from the left in the striped green shirt and hat), me, Russ Shaddix (right of Sgt. LeFrance in the top right), Jackie and her husband (Jackie is on the left above Larry and her husband is second from the left in the furthest back row). Ellie-Mae the German Shepherd in the front row (located in the top right on the second row).
St. Vincent de Paul is a ship manned by a crew of people who believe in simple but radical tenets of love and stewardship inspired by St. Vincent’s acts of selflessness, steered by daily do-gooding and community sustainability. This mural is a documentation of the radical equality and unity found in pockets of our increasingly divided and polarized world, that can be witnessed daily at St. Vincent de Paul of the Redwoods. When we can gather and break bread together, share laughs and stories, we can carry on. What a joy it was to create this piece!
Other local media coverage of the mural can be found at:
https://www.times-standard.com/2022/01/20/eureka-mural-pays-homage-to-st-vincents-volunteers-staff-and-patrons/
https://krcrtv.com/north-coast-news/eureka-local-news/st-vincent-de-paul-in-eureka-receives-new-mural-featuring-city-employees