NATIVITY SCENERY - page one
Designed and painted by Brian
Willis.
Performed by pupils of Bushmills Primary School 2003
"Mary" and "Joseph" outside the stable/cave.
Six Hours
From start to finish, this back wall of the school stage
took six hours to paint. Unfortunately the mural is hampered by the length
of
wood which
runs
right across the
centre. (seen just above the childrens' heads) There is a also a temperature
detecting device which I covered with paper and included in the
cliffs in
the background.
Because of the short time I had allowed myself to paint this "backcloth" I elected to go for a cave instead of the usual stable. Which in essence meant I could roughly block in where I wanted the outline to finish; the geometry of the stones and where the glow of light was to emerge. I then just slapped brown and yellow paint roughly in the direction of where I wanted my stones to lay, then stood back to see what it looked like. Once I had spotted a particular rock formation I then enhanced the shape with black. I usually avoid black but made an exception this time. I finally dabbed a broken piece of sponge, covered with various colours, on to the "rock" face to give it texture.