Susan Clark poses with the mural she painted.
The cancelation of summer community festivals and events has been a disappointment to some, and it has meant a loss of income to many.
In a normal summer, Susan Clark of Chehalis, owner of Suno Henna, would be traveling to various events to offer henna body art as well as sell henna inspired housewares she hand-paints. She would also be booked for a few private events where she might come to a home or organization to offer henna body art. But restrictions surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic have made those impossible right now.
Clark said she is one of the lucky ones, in that her husband was considered an essential worker, so her family did not lack income even during the stay-at-home orders. But she said she knows many artists for whom their art is their only source of income and lacking festivals and community events, they lost easy ways to sell what they make. In response, they’re turning their talents into other ways to make money right now. For instance, she said she has a friend who is normally a quilter and is sewing masks now instead.
“A lot of people are getting creative, especially artists,” Clark said.
For Clark, switching up her artistic offerings meant taking her painting skills from the minute to the humongous. She recently completed a large-scale mural on the side of the barn at Dr. Alicia Spalding’s Winlock Farm. Spalding, owner of Nature Nurture Farmacy in Chehalis, commissioned the work to tie together her medicinal herb garden patch and a planned hydrotherapy space at her farm. Clark had met Spalding a few years ago when she painted the main sign for the Winlock Community Garden and then did a sign for Spalding’s Chehalis office. For Clark, the chance to go big with her artwork seemed like a big challenge that held a big opportunity.
“I’ve been needing to make some pivots and I thought this might be one way I could diversify my offerings,” Clark said.
For Spalding, the concept of the challenge of the pandemic also has a silver lining. As a naturopathic practitioner, she said her practice focuses on preventive medicine and she’s seen an uptick in people seeking information about preventive medicine. And at the Winlock Community Garden, Nature Nurture Farmacy’s largest non-profit work to date, they expanded the garden’s footprint and received donations from numerous local farmers that have allowed them to plant rows of crops that are beginning to produce real food for the community. Coupled with donations from the Olympia non-profit Food is Free, Spalding said the garden has been able to actually help locals supplement their pantries when grocery store shelves were sparse. And it all rolls into her main concept, which is food is medicine.
“This is what I think is super important,” Spalding said. “We have to be able to depend on ourselves locally. I think every school and every church should grow food. We are so fortunate to have so much space here.”
Spalding said Clark’s prior work was the reason she asked her to create the mural on the barn at her farm. Clark said Spalding gave her complete creative freedom on the design. Since it was early spring, Clark said her mind easily went to spring flowers and she came up with a design incorporating pink peonies. Clark said she had no idea her design would end up being very meaningful to Spalding.
“She asked for something pretty so I thought I should do something floral,” Clark said. “Peonies and spring just felt right. But then she told me it was to honor one of her friends who passed away who loved florals.”
Though for the last couple of years, her artwork has been focused more on small, intricate designs, Clark said she had some experience with larger creations. In college, Clark had painted on 4-foot by 6-foot panels and had helped with the creation of a mural in the past as well. She said she started with a sketch on her computer superimposed over a photo of the barn wall so that the design would be to scale. When she got to the actual site to begin working, she realized the wall was a bit larger than she had anticipated but she was able to pace out approximate landmarks in the work and mark them in chalk on the wall before applying paint. Because it is a metal barn, Clark used metal primer paint and then used basic house paint over it. A UV varnish is planned to be added next to make the scene more durable.
Clark said she enjoyed the process of creating the mural, especially because on a couple of occasions her son, 6, and daughter, 3, even got to come along with her. Since the mural was completed during COVID-19 restrictions, she said it was perfect work because they were able to be socially distanced from Spalding and her son, who was learning from home along with the other local schoolchildren, and was able to actually paint a little bit on the design with her.
Though she continues to work on her henna-inspired designs at her home studio, Clark said she would love to add her artistic touches to the community through more mural work in the future. She said one of her favorite locations she would love to paint would be the back wall of the market at 13th Street and Market Boulevard near her home, which she said she feels would be a great location for an interesting piece of art.
“I would love to be able to do some more murals someday,” Clark said. “There are some walls in town that I think could really use something on them.”
