Las Flores de Tejas y Abejas Mexicanas
Going through the archives, what a wonderful and exhilarating time we had installing the Bee Cave Hill Country Galleria Whole Foods’ new premier mosaic mural, titled affectionately “Las Flores de Tejas y Abejas Mexicanas,” or quite simply, the wildflowers of Texas and Mexican honeybees.
I should forewarn you, this is a bit more lengthy recap than usual, since I am home quarantined due to Covid-19 (Coronavirus) and all. That said, you all should have plenty of time to read my rambling all the way to the end! LOL
First of all I want to thank Tony Moreno (darkmode.photo) for putting in the long hours with us after dark in order to capture the entire process from start to finish. Tony has a keen sense of narrative and is always there to capture the laughs and the memories. Also to Carmen, Mason, Alison, Tom, Amie, Ryan, Jesse, Channing, Luis, Yuki, Ayaka, Genevieve and anyone else who helped in any way or came to help and cheer us on. It is always a marathon, and team support is truly invaluable. Here is a time-lapse of installation to show you two long days of work condensed into less than a minute.
As always, there was significant studio time needed to set all the tiles in place before even going to the site, approx 6 weeks in fact. Most of the production is done laying out tiles by the reference images and is incredibly tedious and time consuming, yet infinitely rewarding once the entire composition comes together finally at the end. Also there are so many moments of human improvisation and artistic license that occur while placing tens of thousands of 3/4 inch glass squares, that it certainly keeps us on our toes and in the zone, focused on the work at hand and driving the project forward with human energy, and intermingled with that dubious meeting of spontaneity, intuition, chance and serendipitous synchronicity.
When all 40,460 tiles were in place to fill out a significant wall space area approximately 10ft x 20ft (200 sq/ft), the team is finally ready to venture out on-site to the wall. First, I began by leveling the brick on the exterior facade of the Hill Country Galleria Whole Foods. The brick may look smooth enough, but with tiles as small as these, every little grout line and imperfection would be noticeable up close, and it is just that degree of maniacal perfectionism I must endeavor towards that hopefully instills these projects with the awe and wonder they deserve.
Once the wall was even flatter with a nice and smooth, cured mortar base, we are ready to trowel on the Laticrete platinum 254 thinset adhesive and start to set the panels in place. This, too is a completely nerve-wracking step in that we must keep the panels exactly a grout width apart, just under 1/8 of an inch, 200 times, on a vertical surface, from a cramped scissor lift platform, and it is by far the messiest job you can possibly imagine. It’s like smearing cake batter all over your kitchen at the exact same depth, and then with sticky gloved hands you proceed to do something as delicate as making origami. This may be a bit of an embellishment, but me and my partners know all too well what razor sharp precision is required at this stage, and due to the material constraints, the clock is always ticking! Needless to say, it was a beautiful mess. We started at 8am and wrapped up around 10pm that night.
Those who have done any bit of mosaic or tiling before know this, but basically grout and thinset have what’s called a “pot life.” In other words, it is the average working time you have from the moment you mix the powder with water, until it firms up and begins the curing process. At 75 degrees Fahrenheit, you may get 90 mins or up to two hours out of a batch, if you’re lucky. And let me tell you, that is a very short time to cover 50-100 square feet with accuracy and finesse under such messy circumstances.
Insofar as you keep in mind that temperatures play a huge part in the proper use and setting of these materials, you will know why I did not sleep a wink that first night when it dipped down to 38 degrees. You see, below 50 degrees, and the product refuses to set properly, if at all. Whereas it normally takes just 24 hours to fully cure, it can take up to 96 hours or more at lower temps or with more humidity. Thus, I raced back out in the cold (with windchill was damn near freezing), with the biggest blue tarp I could find, some rolls of Gorilla duct tape, and a couple of extension cords and space heaters. Thank you to Whole Foods patio for lending me electricity overnight, I taped up the whole thing and tented the bottom out to fit space heaters safely up against the wall under the slow-setting mosaic, and, well, prayed in earnest to the thinset gods to help me out.
Checking the surface with a laser thermometer, before wrapping the glass surface was hovering around 40 degrees. A few hours later, I would check again, and much to my satisfaction, the surface temp was 51! I could get some much needed sleep that night.
A few days later, once the thinset had sufficient time to cure, I gently peeled back the mosaic tape on the face of the mural. Thankfully most of the tiles stayed intact! And with a few touch-ups here and there, the piece was ready for grout.
I learned the term “grout family” from one of my mentors the lovely and prolific mosaic artist Stefanie Distefano. Helping her on a huge project last year in Smithville, I volunteered to help her on grout day, and she explained how grout fam is fam for life. And working on a project of that magnitude, it sure does take a lot of hands, buckets of sweat, some dirty clothes and tons of gloves. So I took a note from her book and invited some volunteers alongside my core team to assist on grout day, and I am so thankful I did. With 7 different colors of grout and 200 square feet to cover, we had our work cut out for us.
It started off a little rocky, for in my haste I tripped on the drill mixer cord and kicked over a 2 gallon bucket of grout pigment onto the sidewalk and had to use all my towels to clean it up. Ryan and Jesse saved the day though and picked up a big bag of shop towels on their way from Home Depot to get us through the rest of the day. Each color required masking the area, and working against the clock, as mentioned before, the grout starts setting whether you are finished or not!
We basically worked in two hour shifts, mixing the grout, floating the grout pressing it into the seams between all 40,460 tiles. And just when you think you are done, the grout starts to set and you have to sponge off the tile face, leveling the grout in the seams, and buff away any haze that wants to dry on the glass. It is like washing your car, constantly, for 8+ hours. As if we had all gone to the gym the day before, we were all pretty ragged and sore the day after. Wax on, wax off.. ad infinitum.
With only minor mishaps splattering colored grout blobs on the wall, we kept the work site pretty tidy after the initial spill, except of course for all our dyed footprints walking all over the sidewalk. SMH. Note to self, always bring the biggest drop sheet you can find. Actually here the massive parachute of a blue tarp saved the day yet again!
And thanks to Daniel over at Polis installing a sleek, smooth angle iron steel frame snug around all the edges, with just a little sealant for safe-keeping, the mural was, just like that… Complete!
Sometimes I think back at how intense the install days were, or how mystifying it still is to me how this pixel process somehow all works out in the end, and the intense faith I must keep in my system that developed just a year ago for my first project of this kind at Georgetown’s Municipal Courthouse… And, I must say, after taxes and all the expenses, the money isn’t really that great either. But I have gained something that you can’t quantify in dollars and cents, and those are memories, and feelings of satisfaction from great unknown challenges overcome, with some really awesome and hilarious friends, who for some strange reason keep believing in my wild ideas. So while I fend off the bill collectors and rub Tiger Balm all over my back, I sleep with an exhausted smile of contentment on my face. And wake up excited the next day to do it all over again.
Lastly, a big thank you to The Hive arts center at the Galleria for facilitating the open call for submissions, and of course thanks to the cordial stewards of the property CBRE for going out of their way to give artists a platform to create permanent public statement artworks and footing the bill. You better believe we are hungry for more opportunities in the near future in equally as high-profile spaces for discerning clients the world over. Pixel perfect mosaic mural artwork has only just begun; we are coming to a wall near YOU!
The Mosaic Workshop @ Something Cool Studios
1717 East Cesar Chavez Street in Austin, TX
