I worked on this beautiful Red Eyed Tree Frog as part of a community mural art piece as a part of the Roving Art Cart with Citipark’s at Riverview Park, Pittsburgh, PA. These art pieces are on display at the City County Building in Pittsburgh. I carefully designed this community art piece at home by drawing out a large shaped composition. When we arrived at the park, we invited participants to paint on the canvas. I lead the new painters by giving them color and an area to fill in, all the time giving mini art lessons on painting, blending, types of brush strokes, and mixing colors. Some very interested painters even help in figuring out what colors go where. What a blast! It is incredible to see how much paint we accomplished in three hours! Now the big question, where will this awesome work of art be seen in Pittsburgh?
See more pictures of the work in progress….

It is incredible to see what people can do when they work together. This was all done in three hours of painting!!

Some young painters assist in the project.

I love my job!

This lovely horse is a painting for my friends, Mara and John Roberts at Sterling Printing. This past summer I had a wonderful visit to their barn where we had a blast photographing the horses. I am completely inspired to do a series of horse paintings.

Here is some information about this horse from Mara. “His name is Champion. He is a purebred Arabian with parentage originating from the Polish stud (stud meaning a breeding farm). I think he is six or seven years old . He is a Bay Gelding and born on the farm. We have his parents as well. Having a very sweet nature and easy to work with, he likes humans. He will be one of our future Therapeutic Riding mounts. And as you can attest, he is not camera shy!” Thanks Mara!!! Check out more of the beauties below.

Sigh, I miss the summer already.

This summer, I have been working with the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts to create the Endangered Species Community Art Series. This gorgeous macaw painting was created by participants at the North Side Community festival. Adults and children had the opportunity to paint on a giant pre-drawn canvas to complete this painting. Check out the images of the process.

During the painting process, I create opportunities to show people painting techniques such as how to hold a brush, how to use a brush to paint clean lines, shading, and blending.

I helped children and adults by giving them colors and areas to fill.

The original drawn canvas.

Read the rest of this entry »

llustration for PittMed magazine, Fall 2006 Match Day

Artist Statement for 2006 Sprout Mural Competition:
Life and Liberty
By Alison Zapata

Definitely worth seeing, this impressive mural design is true to the art deco style. Read the rest of this entry »