Your Own Fresco ... as a Paint by Number

I love frescoes & wish I lived in the type of home that could have one (you need plaster walls though) so a mural is my version of that since I'm in a new build home in Ohio instead of a centuries old home in Italy or Spain.  I love frescoes because it's artwork that creates a room.  It transforms a blank wall into a canvas & has no need for silly things like frames & hooks.  It's cannot be shuffled around & rehung.  On the wall of a 300 year old home it declares it will live, breathe & inspire others far longer than I will.  A sparsely furnished room does not feel empty with a fresco, it embraces the open space & fills it with color & brush strokes. 

Frescoes by their nature require an amazingly skilled artist, as you only get one shot.  The pigment needs to be added to the final layer of plaster on a wall before it dries.  It can't be redone later like a mural can.  I'm currently working on a mural in my daughters room (it's far from finished) & though murals are similar to frescoes by creating a scene on a wall, I don't need to be nearly as skilled as one who would paint a fresco.  It's actually so easy that anyone with a blank wall, art projector, pencil & paint can create one.  It helps that I took an art class in high school to add some shading, but seriously, that's all the experience I have; an art class from high school. 

My daughter's nickname is Blueberry & I remembered a book from my childhood Jamberry by Bruce Degen.  The first line in the book is "One berry, two berry.  Pick me a blueberry" & it continues in adorable berry rhymes through the entire book.  I flipped through & found the elements I wanted, then used the projector & drew them on her wall in the placement I wanted (making sure things were roughly the same size). 

The hardest part was adjusting the projector & book as I moved along the wall, keeping it all even.  From there, all I had to do was trace it on the wall & now it's basically a giant paint by number.  I went to Home Depot & picked out sample sizes of the colors I needed.  I was lucky I already had some basics from trying out different colors in my son's room.

Basic colors that are good to have are red, yellow, & blue (primary colors - all other colors can be made from these three), purple & brown are good to get if you need those as well though, because they can look muddy when trying to make them from the primaries.  Get some black & white (use these for highlights & shadowing the color you're using), remember a little black goes a very long way & it takes quite a bit of white to lighten a color.

I tried to remember to take pictures as I went along, but sometimes I was lucky just to get in 5 minutes of painting time before I was needed again & in the rush to put everything away (so I didn't end up with the kids painting their own mural on random walls in the house) the pictures often fell by the wayside.

It's still a work in progress & it's going to take me a while to finish.  I love working on it though, because I think it adds more character than simply painting her walls lavender (like we originally planned).  I think it shows her I love her & care enough to make her personal space, personal.  If I'm ever fortunate enough to live in a home with a fresco on a wall, I'll take time to enjoy it & appreciate that the artist tried to make the space personal for those who would be fortunate enough to live there while the house stands.