2010 Mural Project

Rồng gặp mây": "Dragon meets clouds"

This 42’ x 23’ mural design is location on the Right Wall of the Parking Lot E entrance to Building 1 at Skyline, next to the Art Gallery. The mural area consists of 20 two-tiered vertical section/s of concrete panels that average 2' wide by 23' high.

The mural uses an abstracted form of a Vietnamese Dragon as a starting point for its design, and the Dragon's body is filled with textile patterns from many cultures, representing the diversity of the Skyline College Community. The Dragon image is set against a light blue background with a pale yellow at the top. The Vietnamese Dragon is a Sky dragon, and the blue represents the Sky – the Dragon's abode. The yellow represents moonlight.

Photograph by David Evans

The mural location is ideally suited for a Dragon image. Revered all over Asia, Dragons are seen as benevolent, omniscient, and bring blessings and good fortune. They are commonly located to the right of an entrance to a room or building- this orientation is said to bring good luck to those who pass by. To flow the energy of the image into the entrance to Building 1, the following poem by Song Dynasty Master Xuedou Zhongxian will be painted above the adjcacent doorway:

One, seven, three, five-
The truth you search for cannot be grasped
As night advances, a bright moon
illuminates the whole ocean;
The dragon's jewels are found in every wave.
Looking for the moon, it is here,
in this wave, in the next.

-Xuedou Zhongxian

painting of the poem on the wall in red and white

One of the design challenges for this location was to create an image that tied into the existing gallery mural thematically and visually, yet allowed the new mural room for conceptual expansion. The design is specifically related to the location, and works around existing architectural features. The mural image was designed to be seen primarily from an oblique, foreshortened angle, ‘squishing’ the image into a more compressed form. Note that unlike the first art gallery mural, there is no ‘long-shot’ opportunity for viewing this mural head-on, it can only be viewed from an oblique angle.

Work on the mural began on Thursday, July 15, 2010. The website was updated with weekly posts documenting the painting progression. The Mural was designed and painted by Paul Bridenbaugh, with many thanks to the following volunteer artists for their help with drawing and painting the mural: Art Sato, Teena Makapugay, Alan Ceccarelli, Victoria Maung, Denise Wilkie, Aya Artola, Kim Centeno, Iat-Seng Lam, Elizabeth Wong, Beth Braunstein, Anna-Marie Vargas, Jamie Weinstock, Jessica Daniel, Lone Wang, Wasan Hasan , Olivia Asis, Phil Harris, Gaby Gerson, Qing Liu. Many thanks as well to Vicki Morrow and Donna Bestock for making this project possible.

Mural Progress

November 15

July 20

July 21

July 22

July 22

July 22

July 22

July 26

July 26

July 26

July 27

July 29

August 19

August 19

August 26- Construction/ of a level platform was completed this week, which will allow us to develop painting in the main body of the mural over the next few weeks. A big thank you to Alan Ceccarelli and his theater crew for their assistance in building this platform.

August 26

August 29

August 30

September 8

September 13

September 14

September 15

September 21

September 22. This morning the undepainting phase of the mural is completed. The last part of this phase is underpainting the Jewel in the Dragon's mouth. Now we proceed to the final painting phase. The mural is now approximately halfway completed.

September 22

September 22

September 29

October 6

October 16

October 23

November 2

November 15