Clark Fork Coalition

The Clark Fork Coalition came to me with a project for their Capital Champaign. They wanted a piece of artwork that incorporated donor names and illustrated a Montana landscape. Originally, they were thinking about doing some sort of mosaic. I had not done anything like that before, but thought about creating something out of wood with larger pieces that would resemble the idea of a mosaic. This piece is assembled with 20 different wood panels, of which some are carved and all are painted.

This drawing is the first design concept I submitted. This design shows the separate wood pieces and how they fit within the frame structure.










The next step was to work on a more detailed drawing. I wanted to draw out how the border would work with the rest of the painting, as well as how detail would be added to the center pieces.

After the overall concept was approved, I submitted a to-scale painting so my client would be able to see better rendered design details, as well as color palette ideas.










This is the finished work! You can see the interlocking pieces in the center. All of the dark lines in the painting are carved, which gave this work a nice textural element. This was a great project to work on. It is always fun coming up with creative solutions to creative projects.