THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, October 12, 1994 TAG: 9410110104
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 08 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: By MARLENE FORD, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 159 lines
CAVEMEN DID IT. Michelangelo did it.
During the Depression, W.P.A. artists crossed the country doing it in post offices.
They drew on the walls.
While that's not something that's encouraged in most households, there are artists (called ``wall dogs'') who are paid handsomely for making their mark on homes and businesses. Sometimes it's fanciful - syrupy pancakes on a restaurant window. Other times it's fine art - realistic stingrays gliding along the walls of the Virginia Marine Science Museum.
Former interior designer Camille Winging doesn't measure her mural in square feet, but bare feet. Her playroom wall is a colorful foot race of 167 footprints of her closest friends.
``I was just sitting here late one night nursing Grant when I thought about asking visitors to decorate that blank wall with their footprints. My husband said, `OK, you ask people,' '' Winging said.
Winging recognizes this mural is more fun art than fine art, but in three years she's dipped the feet of people from 3 months to 73 years, from 14 states and two foreign countries into latex paint, and then let them make their mark on her wall. An adjoining wall she also painted includes a more conventional mural of Noah's Ark.
Another young Virginia Beach couple has a vineyard mural painted on the walls of their wine cellar, and one family even has the Lesner Bridge painted on the side of their home.
Mac Houfek displays four black, Oriental style murals and an 8-foot contemporary panel shading one window of her Bay Colony home. In addition, artist Jeff Childress of Creative Colors has adorned her bathroom with painted gold leaves that appear to grow out of a poster.
``People are just doing fun things on walls,'' Houfek said. ``Maybe they're finding out there are good artists around.''
The murals in homes are lovely and/or fun, but it's the drive-by, commercial art, that most people see.
``No way would I paint over my walls,'' George Zervoudakis, owner of Pocohantas Pancake House, said throwing his arms up. ``It would be a disaster to cover and people would complain - big time.''
Murals scroll across the interior of the Atlantic Avenue restaurant. Capt. John Smith, the First Landing Cross, native flora and fauna, the ships, the ocean - every inch of wall is as bustling as the eatery on a July morning.
And every bit of the art, including the giant omelets and club sandwiches, is by veteran Beach muralist James Nelson Johnson. The interior paintings were begun 20 years ago.
Waitress Kate Bader filled cups of java in front of the mural-surrounded beverage station. ``This one is Pocohantas. Well, we don't know for sure, but we decided she was.'' She added, ``We give little history lessons with every breakfast.''
Since Zervoudakis bought the restaurant eight years ago, he has commissioned Johnson to paint murals on his three other eateries.
``Just the windows are a big expense,'' he said. ``When I had to replace one, the glass cost $250 and the painting on it cost $600. But it lets me do something more creative than blinds.''
Chip Wilkinson of Wall Illusions is another well-known artist in town. His work can be seen at the Virginia Marine Science Museum.
``He's one of the best in the country, in my opinion,'' Maylon White, museum curator, said. ``When we had our dolphin exhibit, Chip painted a mural of the resort strip from off the coast. And on the dolphins he painted the individual markings of the dorsal fins from the dolphins we identified.
``It was wonderful. These were our dolphins from our area. But when it came time to paint over that mural for the next exhibit the public was upset. Chip understood it was only temporary art, but we had a lot of complaints,'' White said.
Todd Lindbergh, artist and owner of T.A.L.E.N.T., is yet another Virginia Beach artist, who goes to the wall for his art - and anyone else's.
``I love to watch anybody's new mural going up,'' Lindbergh said enthusiastically. ``It's just a nice group of artists working around here, and it's great to drive by and see someone working.''
Lindbergh, who said mural artists are called ``wall dogs'' and who even named his pet black Labrador, Wall Dog, cast a technical eye at the 20-by-130 foot panorama of the oceanfront from Rudee Inlet to Cape Henry recently painted on Norfolk Paint's Laskin Road store.
``The worst part of the business is working in 105-degree temperature in the summer or wearing four pairs of socks and pants in the winter, but the best part is seeing people, especially little kids, enjoy the work,'' the artist said.
This particular mural took Lindbergh and three associates two weeks of painting and 20 gallons of paint - Norfolk Paint. Lindbergh charges about $5,000 for this size job.
``Some people ask me how do you paint so big,'' Lindbergh said. ``I tell them I just close my eyes. But really I squint. When I close my eyes I can tell if the proportions are right. For me the bigger the wall, the better.''
Lindbergh began his career as a teen working with a local billboard painter. His first mural on his own, just seven years ago, was a giant spark plug on an auto parts store. ``I got paid $75 for it, and it's still there,'' he said.
Today he paints full time, but makes it clear that he considers five to 10 jobs to be a very good year.
After painting the free-hand, wrap-around Mexican themed mural on Mi Casita restaurant on Bonney Road, he was commissioned to do another Mexican restaurant in Richmond and a steak house in West Virginia.
Lindbergh and other painters can quote the city sign ordinance these days, and with good reason. Several years ago when Eric Henn painted one of his first jobs in the area his work earned more than the praise of art devotees. It became a political controversy.
The gremlin-like ``Noid'' logo of Domino's pizza turned into a sign ordinance nightmare for a resort strip trying to upgrade its appearance. The ``Noid,'' which was ultimately grandfathered under the ordinance, still haunts its Pacific Avenue parlor, but the official eye governing signage has become considerably more vigilant. Murals, considered signs, cannot display the product of the business they decorate or even suggest the identity or nature of that business.
Henn has since has gone on to paint a Wyland-inspired whale wall on Diamond Springs Road, a horsy pasture scene on Acredale Saddlery in Kempsville and the vineyard backdrop at the trendy Five O1 City Grill on Birdneck Road.
The restaurant's co-owner, Mike Atkinson, said, ``Our interior designer put us in touch with the artist. It's a wrap-around mural, two walls and it wasn't cheap - four grand.''
An ancient vineyard scene, the view is through a crumbling wall. A vintner carries a sack of grapes toward a background of blue-green mountains.
``What a guy, Eric,'' Atkinson said. ``We got to calling him Picasso. He looks like a biker, but he's an artist. Some days he would paint 20 minutes, then go. One day he came in, got a roller out and started all over again. That was rough on us, but it just wasn't the way he wanted it. He's an artist.''
Atkinson said that today he considers the mural worth 10 times what he paid for it in 1992. And like the other owners of wall art, he said, ``Now I couldn't picture the place without it.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photos by MORT FRYMAN
Color on the cover
Camille Winging and her children, Haley, 5 1/2, left; and Grant, 3
1/2, show off their playroom, which is decorated with 167 footprints
of friends. Visitors aged 3 months to 73 years, from 14 states and
two foreign countries have dipped their feet into colorful latex
paint to leave their mark on the wall.
This 3D-looking mural by Chip Wilkinson of Wall Illusions helps
bring a hands-on exhibit to life at the Virginia Marine Science
Museum.
ABOVE: Murals scroll across the interior of Pocohantas Pancake House
on Atlantic Avenue, bringing Capt. John Smith and other characters
to your table.
RIGHT: A Wyland-inspired whale wall by Eric Henn decorates the side
of a business called East Coast Liquidators on Diamond Springs
Road.
ABOVE: With his pet black Lab, nicknamed Wall Dog, at his side, Todd
Lindbergh recently completed a 20-by-130 foot oceanfront scene on
the side of Norfolk Paint's Laskin Road store.
Photo by MARLENE FORD
LEFT: Hayley Hess gets a closer view of Lindbergh's work.
by CNB