Press

By Anthony Kim

A two-story-tall mural being painted at Daily High School that depicts a green dragon swooping down from the sky and bursting through a brick wall isn't just a colorful addition to the campus. It's also emblematic of the challenges being met by the school's students.

Students were painting about 10 panels Tuesday that would eventually go up on a series of walls along an outside staircase.

"It's not just one person's work," said Zack Cargar, 18. "It's all of us. It's our work. We did it ourselves."

The tail of the dragon will wind back and forth down the side of a building, with sections of the dragon on walls coming down the staircase. Near the bottom of the staircase, the head will appear to be smashing through the wall, and then the final panel at the bottom of a staircase has the school's name in graffiti-art lettering.

"Initially we wanted it to be edgy, representative of the student body and be contemporary," art teacher Emily Goff said.

The mural will depict the school's mascot " the Daily Dragon " but it also represents the character of the school's student body, said Mark Makkouk, 18, who was painting the scales during art class on Tuesday.

"A lot of people that come to this school, it's because they had problems," he said. "The dragon is breaking through the wall because that's what we're doing here, breaking through challenges."

Goff and Roger Dolin, a professional muralist, had only a administrative role for the project, Goff said. The students formulated ideas, created designs and planned the project entirely on their own, she said.

"It's been an exercise in real-life skills, working with clients, making revisions, making compromises and presenting designs on a timely basis," Goff said.

Chris Sabino, 17, was in the classroom touching up the latest design for the lettering, which school officials have repeatedly sent back for revision due to concerns about the lettering looking "inappropriate."

Chris volunteered to create the lettering because he draws graffiti art in his journal. "I only do it on paper," he said. "I have my own little books. I keep it to myself usually."

But with the mural project, he will get a chance to show off his talents for the school " and for posterity.

The project be the continuation school's first mural since it moved into its permanent building next to the school district offices in August 2001, Goff said.

Art students at the continuation school have been designing and revising the mural since December. But the first splashes of color went up on Saturday, when students went to school to start the painting phase, Goff said.

Many of them take pride in their work and the rest of the school has been supporting them, she said.

"It's like the best class I've ever had," Zack said.

By Anthony Kim

Glendale High School student Christine Saakyan, 18, from left, ceramics instructor Christine Rose, and artist in residence Roger Dolin work together to assemble a ceramic tile mural at Glendale High School Friday afternoon. -- Alex Collins / News-Press

Residents Enjoy their New Scenic Vista Solheim Lutheran Home- Eagle Rock, California

The Tai Chi Mural in Progress- Eagle Rock, California

The Wave- Huntington Beach- November 1998

SOMETHING TO SEA-

Underwater Mural Creates a Calm Atmosphere for Kindergartners at the Boys and Girls Club Kingston Branch

By Elisabeth Deffner


It's probably the only place you'll see a 10-foot-long eel grinning at you. And definitely the only place your response would be to smile back.

The plump, sinuous eel winds its way around the fish, starfish and drifting kelp that are part of the mural in the Primary Program room of the Boys and Girls Club of Huntington Valley's Kingston branch at Mile Square Park.

The Boys and Girls Club offers a variety of before-and after school recreation programs for children in kindergarten through eight grade, director Tanya Grimes said. In the room with the mural, kindergarten-age children participate in activities ranging from cooking to computer games. The mural was an unexpected bonus, Grimes notes. The underwater-scape is really the result of Orange Coast Memorial Medical Center's sponsorship of the club. Dr. Barry S. Arbuckle, who holds a Ph.D. in developmental psychology and is the medical center's chief executive officer, said the Fountain Valley mural has quite a lengthy history.

Mural Environments, the Van Nuys-based company that painted the mural, was originally recruited by Long Beach Memorial Medical Center to create a child-friendly ambiance. The entrances were painted with an aquatic theme, and a four-story-tall mural stretches along the stairwell from the ground floor to the top. All the layers of the ocean are represented, from treasure sunken in the sand to the water line beneath the sky.

Similar ocean paintings were made in the pediatric unit at Orange Coast Memorial, Long Beach Memorial's sister hospital. "The same idea flowed over (into the Boys and Girls Club)," Arbuckle said. As part of the medical Center's sponsorship, Mural Environments painted a scene on the wall of the kindergarten room.

Roger Dolin, the CEO of Mural Environments, said a lot of planning went into the mural. The colors, from the blues and aquas of the water to the browns and taupes of the sand, were carefully chosen for their calming effect. Translucent glazes, containing a small amount of pigment, were layered onto the base painting, adding depth and a realistic water effect to the mural. "It's one of the more subtle things, but we try to pay attention in every (detail)," Dolin said.

Upon first viewing, a visitor may not notice such details, but as Grimes noted, "Everybody is kind of mesmerized when they first walk in." And what do the 5-year-olds think of it? Grimes says they like it, but they don't pay any special attention to it. "That's just kind of part of life for them," she said.

Los Angeles Times, September 20 1996

Fairy Tales Come to Life on Pediatric Ward Walls

Jacqueline Marr, 3, takes a long look at a Friendly Giant at Fountain Valley Regional Hospital.

By Lesley Wright

Hansel and Gretel, Jack (of beanstalk fame) and other fairytale characters have been admitted to the pediatric ward at Fountain Valley Regional Hospital and Medical Center. Mural artist Roger Dolin is painting their likenesses on walls, doors and walkways stretching the length of the 24 bed unit. The goal is to amuse and distract small patients visiting for injections, tests and other treatments, hospital officials said.

"The idea was to make it fun," said Vicki Lombardo, director of maternal and children's health services. She had seen Dolin's work at a hospital in San Bernardino and recommended him when Fountain Valley Regional was planning to remodel its children's unit.

"This is a piece of the therapy," Lombardo said. "If the children are upset and nervous, it makes therapy more difficult. This calms and distracts them."

The brightly colored characters appear to be doing their job. Three-year-old Jacqueline Marr, admitted for a few days this week for an eye infection, took her mother on a tour to point out her favorite parts of the mural. "It's really neat for the kids," mother Kathy Marr said. "You can walk around and tell them stories."

Though the artwork added about $12,000 to the cost of remodeling, making it a $20,000 project, officials of the private hospital felt that it would be worth the money by helping to make the facility more attractive in a highly competitive healthcare market.

Dolin, 39, whose mural business is based in his Van Nuys home, has painted fantasies on the walls of nearly 30 hospitals between San Diego and San Francisco. He said he goes to healthcare seminars to learn more about his clients' needs.

He and four assistants started working in Fountain Valley in July and hope to have the last castle completed by the end of this month.

The fairytale scenes merge into each other so that young patients can walk through a forest along a path that leads to a town square and then to a castle, the nurses' station.

To represent the city's ethnic diversity, the mural depicts not only European fairy tales but also images of Vietnamese and Chinese children.

"I wanted to paint big, to paint for the other people instead of for myself," said Dolin, a fine arts graduate of Cal State Northridge who has been painting murals since he was a teenager. "I like knowing my work has a long term effect."

Romantic Homes Magazine, July 1996
LAND OF DREAMS
Come discover a place where waking rivals the best of dreams.

Pretending comes easy in this life-sized dollhouse, complete with a working door and bell, as well as a beautiful garden mural running up the side. Photo © 1996 Blackstone Edge Studios

By Donna Pizzi

In the land where dreams come true, dollhouses are not just for play-they are for living too. At least that's true at this Los Angeles, California home, where two-year-old Samantha Deutchman's bedroom has been magically transformed into a miniature Victorian home, complete with English garden, climbing roses, real roofing tile, and a working doorbell.

Samantha's mother, Cess Deutchman, decided early on that she wanted to give her children the best childhood possible. She dreamed up the idea for the miniature playhouse and sleeping area one night when Samantha was only one.

"I grew up in the Philippines, playing in an outdoor dollhouse in keeping with the architecture and materials native to my island," explains Cess, "and I wanted something like that for Samantha. But I wanted it to be indoors where she could make more use of it." Since Cess loves English gardens and architecture, the Victorian idea quickly followed. "I was such a tomboy," recalls Cess with a laugh, "but my best friend was not. When we were growing up, there was always such a disparity between us. Later on, I felt like I'd missed out on all that little girl stuff." The Victorian dollhouse was Cess's way of ensuring that Samantha, her third child and long-awaited daughter, would not miss out. "For me, it's like a dream come true," sighs Cess. "It's so feminine-like cotillion debuts."

To make her vision a reality, Cess worked with interior designer Maude MacGillivray. Together, the studied photos of English and New England homes, deciding to add touches like the picket fence, real siding, and actual roofing tile to give Samantha the feeling that she was truly in a home of her own. Scaled-down furniture-perfect for a doll's tea party-was added, as well as Dutch doors, hand painted wallpaper, and a window that looks into a second play area down the stairs.

Cess's only fear was that her vision might not correspond with her daughter's, especially since her two older brothers eat, sleep, and dream of nothing but sports.

What would happen, Cess wondered, if one day Samantha announced to her that she wanted a baseball diamond in her room instead of this very feminine dollhouse?

Luckily for Cess, Samantha took to the idea immediately. Although she was not speaking in complete sentences when the room was finished, she was able to express her utter joy to everyone in sight by dragging them to her room, where she would exclaim in two-year-old fashion, "My home, my home."

A year and a half later, Samantha is still mesmerized by the whole concept. In fact, playing house remains one of her favorite pastimes.

"She likes having the feminine part of childhood, but balances it extremely well with athletics and gymnastics," says Cess. "I've seen her play with her dolls wearing a dress and her baseball cap."

And so the dream lives on.

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