Chalk is used to create highly refined, 3-D street paintings.
Contemporary artists Edgar Mueller, Julian Beever and Kurt Wenner use chalk to create hyper-realistic, 3-D street paintings. Unlike most street graffitists, the 3-D pavement artists are highly influenced by Renaissance and Mannerist painters, such as Rembrandt and Michelangelo. The chalk artists follow strict rules of perspective to create illusionistic trompe l'oel images meant to fool you into thinking you're looking at real people and objects. The chalk 3-D street paintings have a short life span, usually until the next rainfall. They are soon worn away by traffic and pedestrians.
Instructions
1. Plan the drawing for the 3-D street painting. Draw a detailed composition for the painting. Borrow images from Classical, Renaisance or old master pictures. Rework and update the images to include modern elements while painting in the style of Leonardo da Vinci or Raphael. Make a large, finished compositional drawing of the chalk painting. Use complex, three-point perspective with multiple vanishing points to make it seem like you're viewing the scene from above.
2. Estimate the size of the street painting and buy enough chalk for the job. Plan on a large-scale work of art to attract the most attention from passers-by. Scout out locations for the artwork. Look for side streets with very little traffic. Consider parking lots, plazas or anywhere there is an open expanse of level pavement. Get permission from the proper authorities before you start work to avoid being hassled by local police.
3. Use anamorphic perspective to distort your image so it appears normal when viewed from an oblique, street-level angle. Draw a grid of regular squares over your drawing. Make a second grid on the street. Tape it off in perspective so it appears to recede into the distance by making the grid squares progressively smaller. Project the drawing from the regular grid on to the anamorphic grid to elongate and stretch out the image. The image will seem distorted from most viewpoints.
4. Sweep your chosen area with a wide shop broom to remove dirt, dust and debris. Pick the vantage point where the image appears normal and set up a camera on a tripod to record and view the work in progress. Check the image periodically through the camera to keep things in proper perspective. Draw a detailed image on the grid with pencil-like chalk sticks.
5. Peel the grid tape off the pavement. Block in the backgrounds with large blocks of chalk. Define the basic shapes and forms with round chalk sticks. Start in the middle of the scene and work out to avoid smearing. Blend the chalk with your fingers or a paper blending stump for highly nuanced old master sfumato shading effects. Use high contrasts of light and shadow to make the image stand out. Add lots of accented highlights to suggest points of reflected light.
