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Mural no. 1

Caio Terra - Plateau BJJ

Raccoon Mural

Raccoon Mural Progress

 August 2024 I have been tasked to design and paint a mural. A Raccoon mural! The mural now lives at Caio Terra Brazilian jiujitsu association gym Plateau BJJ, in Montreal’s Plateau-Mont-Royal neighbourhood.

So, the task was to depict a new team’s mascot. I find these animals to be well loved in Montreal! Certainly, due to their mischievous nature.

Moreover, raccoon Jiujitsu skills are actually pretty impressive! They are natural grapplers well suited to represent the sport. Naturally these animals lend themselves well to the artwork which would inspire playful, focused and fun environment to train in.

Raccoon mural progress and scale
raccoon sketches
raccoon sketches

sketches

To start with, I’ve gone through my own photos of raccoons and scribbled some sketches. After that, I went over the instagram of my dear friend Amelia and scribbled some more raccoons from her gorgeous photos .

I figured out raccoons are very strange in shape – usually a big blob of fluff on top of stick like legs under and their human like little hands. Aside from this, they also start looking like a bear or a dog if you get the proportions just slightly off!
Raccoon mural sketch design

Design I

First pass of the design for the mural was a bit more abstract and sketchy. I’ve looked at Banksy for inspiration (oh no!) as well as Maxim Fallmann who uses a similar loose sketchy style and exaggerated features. in fact, personally I am a fan of the yellow eye and smirky looks the raccoons are giving each other, but I decided to explore other styles!

Raccoon sketch mural design

Design II

For the second mural design I was inspired to recreate a linocut look, giving it playful, bold, comic book inspired look. In addition, I aimed to have the raccoons look much more concentrated and playful instead of angry - as jiujitsu is ought to be. Lastly, the style easily translates to large scale and looks well - and it has led me to the final iteration.

Raccoon mural design sketch

Design III

Finally I experimented with softer, rounder and cleaner line-work, planning to underline the lines with more washed out, painterly undertones. Furthermore, I considered adding colour there but decided to leave it for a future project which would be naturally asking for this type of design.

Final raccoon mural design

Final Design of the raccoon mural

Finally, for the last draft I have added some depth to the monochrome colours and spread out some splashy detail, reminding of comic books and, as previous designs set, linocut prints.

Consequentially, these design details lead to an easy transfer onto the wall via a projector. moreover, loose and fun style allowed to play with the final render right on the wall.

The mural

The mural took three days to complete. Luckily, the gym’s space was big and therefore perfect for upscaling the raccoon mural design to the wall via projection. Meanwhile, the biggest chunk of the work was done on day two, the final painting session allowed me to add all the little details that would bring this painting and its environment together.

For the painting, I have used some leftover paint the gym and I had in our respective stashes of building materials. Further, I hope to continue the using up and reusing trend with the future projects. hopefully, maybe even go thrift some old paint!

And now! Check out the results below!

Liked what you see? Have an empty wall or object?

Let’s work together!

If you enjoyed this jiujitsu raccoon mural and:

• have an empty wall or large object;

• dream to personalize your home or business;

• care about sprinkling some magic to the world;

Send me a message!

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©2024. Adelė Olšauskaitė. All Rights Reserved.

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