Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Tuscan Garden Mural - Sketches for the Client

I was hired to paint a Trompe-l'oeil mural in my clients backyard on a garage wall facing their garden. Trompe-l'oeil  is French for 'trick the eye'. For those of you who don't know, it's a style of painting that creates an optical illusion, a three-dimensional, realistic image.

They just finished a 4-year remodel project on a beautiful house in Sacramento and they want a Tuscan countryside mural to finish off the garden. Here's a couple sketch options I showed them. What do you think?


 Click on the images to see them bigger. These are the two options for inside the arch, the center piece of the mural . If you click the links below, you can see the whole mural.



4 comments:

My Mid-Afternoon Daydream said...

They're both so lovely! #2 is maybe more dynamic but I actually like the #1 sketch more when combined with the entire design (crumbling wall). Can't wait to see your finished painting!! :o)

Harriett said...

Both are perfect and look very Italian. I prefer the one with the tree also. It seems to emphasize the arch.

Valerie Krist said...

Thanks! I think I like the tree one, too. The composition's a little better, but I'm trying not to pick because that guarantees the client will pick the other one!

Rebecca Sutherland said...

Very nice. It reminds me of the returning home dream sequence in Gladiator.