The K-6 students at Fillmore Central got a chance to help create Preston’s new landmark, a 16’ x 26’ outdoor mural that will be hung on the wall of the Preston Public Library above the entrance to the city offices.
“The Preston Arts Council had been wanting to do a mural for quite some time,” Alison Love Unzelman said. Kay Spangler, a member of the council knew that Unzelman had created murals before and asked if she would meet with the council to make her pitch.
The members of the Arts Council worked with Unzelman to design the mural, making sure that it accurately depicted the heart of Preston. After several months of hammering out the details of location, size, images, and more, the mural design was finalized. The Preston City Council was involved in the process as well and approved the location.
The next step was painting the mural. Unzelman had done extensive research to determine what material would be best and decided on sheets of aluminum to prevent rust.
“The mural can stand for decades,” she said, adding that painting it on the aluminum rather than on the building itself would make it more durable. Two coats of outdoor varnish will be applied to each panel of the mural before it’s hung.
Unzelman ordered 14 sheets of aluminum from a machinist shop and etched them, which allowed the primer she used to stick to the surface. She then drew an outline of the mural design, blew it up to the full 16’ x 26’ size, and transferred it to the aluminum sheets.
Then came the fun part – the pop-up studios. They were open to the public, and community members of all ages were welcome to help paint the aluminum panels for the mural. The volunteers worked on painting the base colors for the mural. After each pop-up studio, Unzelman carted the panels back to her studio in Becker, Minnesota to add the highlights, shadows, and details. The first two pop-up studios were held at Christ Lutheran for a week-long period in July and in August.
The third and final pop-up studio took place in October at Fillmore Central art teacher, Ann Sparks’ room. Each student, from kindergarten through 6th grade, was able to spend about five minutes painting a section of the mural.
“I’m sure some kids might have liked to paint longer, but we wanted to make sure everyone had a chance,” Unzelman said.
Mrs. Sparks had been a part of the process for the mural since the beginning stages and was excited to see her art students participate.
The painting took place during each class’s regular art class time. The students were able to paint some of the leaves and the background color for the bluff on the mural. Members of the Arts Council volunteered in the room to help the kids get their paint shirts on and wash up after they were done painting.
A mockup of the mural was hung up in the Mrs. Sparks’ classroom so the students could see what the finished product will look like and to show them what they just helped to paint. A black and white 4 ½ foot tall paper version of the mural was also available in the classroom for the kids to color however they wanted while they waited their turn to paint the real deal. Unzelman took pictures of each class when they were done painting, and the pictures will be hung up in the hallway outside of the art room along with the poster of the mural that the children colored.
“Some of the kids were really excited about it,” Mrs. Sparks said. “They said that they planned to bring their kids back when they get older and show them what they were a part of.”
Many of the other teachers came to look at the mural and some, including Superintendent Richard Keith, even helped paint some of it.
While she was at Fillmore Central, Unzelman got to see her 3rd grade teacher, Mrs. Paulson. Her former art teacher, Gary Post, even stopped in to help paint the mural with the kids.
The completed mural is scheduled to be hung in May, 2017.