I’ve just begun collaborating with a local artist who wants to make a fairly large mural out of wood. The idea we’ve come up with is to design impressionistic type pieces based on arranging square wood blocks into the larger image. The plan is to develop different finishing techniques for the blocks to give them different color intensities, contrasts between the grain, and overall color. The blocks will be used as ‘pixels’ if you will in the larger image, so the smaller the wood block the higher the resolution of the final image. I would imagine the blocks will be between 1 and 2″ square. The idea is mine but I’d never be able to do this without an artist. She’ll be doing the true ‘art’ part and I’ll just be providing as wide a variety of finishes on these blocks as possible. The wider her variety of wood blocks to choose from the better the end result will be.
So as an example, here’s an art piece I found on Etsy. It seems the artist here has either baked or burn treated these pieces. I’m taking this idea as inspiration on how I can vary the finishes on these wood blocks. But I’d like to have as many coloring/finishing options as possible, which is the purpose of writing here.
picture here
What I need now are both wood species suggestions and finishing techniques. Just brainstorming so everything’s on the table.
I need different wood grain size options. Need both wider and narrower grained species.
Would be nice to have a species where both the fast and slow growth rings take dye stain so they have the same hue.
Need coloring / technique suggestions. I’ve used General Finishes water based dye stains before so that’s one idea for generating color.
Thanks for your ideas.
Replies
You have the right idea to use dye for color as the possible color variations are endless. Don''t forget to also experiment with different textures and tooling to create further variations.
Thanks for the tooling advice. Hadn't thought about that yet.
My first thought is the mural will be a mosaic of smaller, un-flattened, end-grain cutting boards all attached to a vertical substrate. Build and finish a few of these ‘cutting board’ until the artist approves and then mass replicate and arrange to get the desired patterns. Be sure to leave gaps to account for wood movement across the entire wall.
Leaving gaps, hadn't thought about that. Thanks I'll keep that in mind now with the final pieces.
A lot of woods darken with age. If this art installation is to be in place for any length of time it will darken from UV exposure. There are UV protective finishes available. They are usually geared towards exterior use.
Thanks for the UV finish advice.