Unfortunately mistitled as ‘The Casket’ in the Gaia News Weekly – 24th Edition, was the second time I had painted a locker at one of my jobs. The gaming shop I work at has two levels: The main store on the main level with shelves crammed with miniatures, books, paints, and games and three gaming tables for customers to use, and then there’s the basement level affectionately called The Dungeon with five more gaming tables and the walls lined with lockers for frequent customers to store their gaming supplies.
Before I volunteered to help with their convention setups or work on their online sales, I would spend at least one if not two days a week sitting at the front table of the main floor and paint miniatures. At that time, my husband and I only rented one locker, which sufficed for the handful of games and books we had and my painting supplies. The owner of the shop was aware of my skills since he was kind enough to let me sell some of my prints through his shop. One day, while he was rearranging some of the furnishings to make more space in The Dungeon, he told me about the history of the building and asked my opinion of a particular space that was shaped like a window. It was originally the coal-shoot used for supplying the fuel needed to heat the building, but it had since been closed and cemented up. “Should I build a set of shelves to fit in there, or would you like to paint something in there?” He expressed how he wanted to add some color to the basement, and believed that other customers would likely commission me to paint their lockers if it was something I was willing to offer.
I might submit what I painted in that spot to one of the two art contests at a later point in time, but before I digress to much, there are still some fun tidbits I like to share. One thing most people later learn about my artwork is that it always comes with a story. wink
The first locker I painted was my own, which consisted of a sunrise at a beach in Florida that my sister sent me a picture of when she was down that way. On that beach, I drew a blue dragon, lounging and resting while it watched another dragon that was silhouetted in the sky. I painted the blue dragon for my husband, as it is his favorite color.
However, when noticing the placement of the locks on some of the other lockers that were unlike our own, I soon took inspiration from Wayward Leather Design and wanted desperately to paint a mimic! But, I wanted it to be a surprise!
I later got permission from one of our friends to paint my idea on his locker, simply stating that I wanted to paint a treasure chest and the position of his lock was perfect what the image. He was pretty cool with it and was intrigued by the progress I made each week. Two days each week I would pluck away at painting. Mapping out what I wanted where, adding details to the background and middle ground before tackling the treasure chest. Each week, he wasn’t sure what he was looking at and was reminded each time he saw it that it hadn’t been completed the week before.
Only two people were aware of the fact that I was going to turn the treasure chest into a mimic: My husband and a frequent customer who came down regularly to play Magic -The Gathering. It was a secret well kept, because as I ‘completed’ the chest and continued onto the foreground, the details that indicated that it was meant to be a mimic had not been added.
Oh no. I waited and patiently plucked away at the remainder of the piece; saving the final details of the open eye, winking eye, and the tooth to the very end. As I was posting the final results to my project page, the manager of the gaming shop took a quick peek over my shoulder before suddenly racing down the stairs. A week later, the friend who rented the locker suddenly found himself being watched. ^_^ No one expected it to turn out the way it did! And, if you look closely enough, you’ll find that there is a silhouette of a dragon in the painting. wink
