If you're passing through Denver International Airport (DIA) between now and June 2016, don't go through the crazy security lines... take the Bridge Security on level 6. Not only is it more relaxing, but you'll get the joy of checking out a breathtaking exhibition by local artists Wopo Holup, Heather Patterson and Mindy Bray while you and your luggage traipse across to TSA. It's a series of abstract interpretations of the Colorado landscape.
If you're still killing time, head down to the newly-constructed Westin Hotel at DIA. On the bottom level where the train comes in is a giant mural, also by Mindy Bray, entitled Strange Continents. Mindy photographed splashes on the Platte River (which runs through Denver) then traced the shapes as vectors and recombined them into this 150-foot long, 14-foot tall composition. She then projected the composition onto many sheets of butcher paper, traced the shapes by hand using colored chalk, and used squeegees to rub the shapes on the chalked-up paper onto the walls at the hotel. With that stage finished, it was then an enormous paint-by-number endeavor. Because of the scale of Strange Continents, Mindy hired me and two other local artists, Lynn Suyeko Mandziuk and Brian Napier, to help with the production stage in the fall of 2015. It was a fantastic team, and a very...shall we call it entertaining?... setting with construction noises happening all around us and curious people walking through. We also had to wear safety goggles the whole time, which is nice for safety, but quite the obstacle for painting detail work.
