Hillside Breeze: A Commission Story
By Paul Yost
Art is passion. Jennah and I put our hearts, souls, and passion into every piece of art we create. To have the opportunity to turn an experience, a dream, or an idea into a piece of art is one of the most rewarding things about being an artist. While exploring our own unique expressions through copper is one way to fulfill those goals, doing commissioned artwork for our clients is the most rewarding—and challenging—work we do.
Our joy in these endeavors stems from all the things we take into account when creating a commissioned art project for a client. For our commission Hillside Breeze, we were influenced by the personalities, vision, and home of our clients. The result was a beautiful triptych that highlighted all three.
Using Art to Illustrate a Friendship
Most importantly: we enjoy working with our clients. Getting to know them personally creates a friendship that we imbue in the finished pieces of artwork. In this commission’s case, both of the clients were laid back, friendly, and kind people who carried an aura of hardwork and the satisfaction of its completion. They were hardworking professionals that valued the serenity they felt while at home. They appreciated the juxtaposition of stepping through their front door after a busy day to enjoy the quiet solitude of the peaceful space held within. We like to take ideas like these into account when designing pieces for a space. We wanted Hillside Breeze to be a welcoming reminder that this space is seperate from the duties and struggles outside of the home. To accomplish this goal, we employed softer hues in the design to purvey a sense of calm.
I was nearly finished installing the wall art when one of the clients returned home from work. He walked into the living room, gazed up at the pieces, and laid down on the carpet. It was a beautiful moment of meditation to let the experiences of the day melt into the joy of being at home. It was a gratifying experience to see the client just relaxing, enjoying his home with his wife, and to be a small part of adding joy for both of them in the future.
Realizing the Client’s Vision through Copperwork
Commissions are an opportunity for people to realize an artistic vision through our copperwork. For Hillside Breeze, the clients came to us for a commission because they wanted to bring the outside indoors. This goal inspired us to utilize several nature motifs in the piece to illustrate a breeze blowing through trees on a hillside. The overall tree design mirrored the beauty surrounding their home. We decided to mimic deciduous trees to contrast the evergreens outside the window.
Designing Commissions for A Specific Space
During the design process for a commission, we take into account as many details as we can to create the artwork for that specific space and vision. That includes the windows, architecture, paths of travel, orientation to the path of the sun…the list goes on. It is so rewarding to design a piece that works organically with a space, adds stunning beauty, and maintains a native feel to the room.
Accentuating the Architecture
In the case of Hillside Breeze, we couldn’t have asked for a more impressive space to hang our art. The client's home was perched on a northwest facing hillside in south Eugene, Oregon. The piece would be placed in a peaceful living room that acted as the main entry of the home. Its high-sloped ceilings and giant picture windows lining the perimeter of the room allowed breathtaking views of the majestic fir trees outside and green pastures in the valley below.
Jennah and I designed the triptych’s pieces with a vertical aspect to work congruently with the high ceilings and visually enlarge the room’s vertical space. The center panel is slightly larger than the two outside panels to further accentuate the architecture of the room. Creating the artwork with a taller center panel makes the eye travel from the edge of the triptych towards the center panel and then upwards. Like viewing the pyramids in Egypt or cathedrals in Europe from a distance, the eye travels from the base of the structure up towards the highest point at the top, then skyward. This creates a steeple effect that transports the viewer from the finite horizontal space of earth towards the infinity of vertical space above. It is intended to draw the eye upwards and create an inspiration of the divine. These same visual tendencies of the human brain work just as well in enclosed spaces, and with adjustments to the dimensions of our artwork, can be used to make the vertical space seem larger.
A further design element we employed is an abstraction of the wind breezing up the hillside, which can be seen traveling through all three pieces of the triptych in the curved lines behind the trees. These curves mirror the front doorway’s architecture. We curved the lines towards the center of the living room so when you look at the work, your eye moves to the center of the room rather than to the wall. This helped enlarge the living space.
The shades of color in the pieces not only work with one another, but also work together to exist appropriately in the area. Since the home was designed with wide open areas, we wanted the artwork to be part of the flow of the floor plan. Those wide open spaces create a feeling of freedom to move about the home and we attempted to mirror this idea in the swooping design aspects of the pieces. The intent of the swooping designs, traveling left to right in the pieces, was created to bring the breezes from the outdoors inside the home, to create a freedom of movement. We wanted the “feeling” of the artwork to mimic the “feeling” of the shared open space of the living room, dining room, and kitchen areas. Our goal was to make that area of the house feel like a screened porch in late summer. The warmth of the sun, the cool breeze of the evening, and the soft colors of sunset recreated in an interior experience.
Accounting for Home Decor
The color scheme of the artwork was designed to mesh with the color scheme of the home while maintaining enough contrast to invite the viewer to approach the artwork. The color palette we chose for this art commission was intended to not only contrast with the cream colored walls, but also work in tandem with the color of the wood trim throughout the living room and kitchen areas. The intent was to work organically with the interior palette to integrate and not overpower the softness of the space.
Playing with Light
Since copper is a reflective surface, light plays a huge role in how we design our copperwork. We had our clients send us pictures of the space at different times of day. This allowed us to see how the light changed over time and how it reflected in the room. We were excited to see that the wall dedicated to the commission had beautiful light that changed throughout the day. At times, the light went directly into the living room; at other times, the light was directed on the wall.
To use the room’s light to full effect, we burnished the copper to direct the light reflecting off it before we put the color and design on the piece. We wanted to grab and embellish the natural light coming through the window and also provide a unique experience as you entered through the front door. As a result, Hillside Breeze invites guests into the living room as you enter the home.
To this day this commission is still dear to our hearts. There is nothing more satisfying than seeing a smile come over a client’s face when they first see the artwork we created just for them.