In October a lovely woman came to me with a request regarding a centrally located wall in her home. For quite a while she had been considering what she could do to create a visually interesting space that she would love and enjoy living with. She said she finally decided that what she wanted on the wall was a lighthouse that her daughter had photographed in Salem.

This is the wall that called out for something unique to be placed on it, and this is the photo that was eventually chosen.

Consideration was given to having a wall-sized photo reproduced and attached to the wall or painting directly on the wall.

I’m so glad she asked me to paint it and having accepted the commission, my first step was to design the idea to fit the dimension of the wall and then to paint a 20″ high painting of my vision for approval. This is the undeveloped painting on paper.

20″ x 10″ Painting on Paper

You can see in the following stages how the painting progressed over the period of 2 weeks.

December 1 – Areas blocked in
December 7 – Lighthouse painted

December 8 – Seagull painted
December 13 – Painting Complete

From a feng shui point of view, having the water wrap around the corner really softens the edge. The sea grant (bird) on the left carries the image further. The lighthouse is now the focal point of the room, and it has a very different perspective depending on where you’re standing.

This was her Christmas present to herself. She told me how she never felt she could spend money on herself while her kids were growing up and now they agreed she should endulge herself.

A happy ending.