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The Making of Gathering Place: A Painting for Our Water Tower

Me, holding the original painting below the water tower reprint installation

This year, I was invited to create a painting for the new water tower in our beloved, magical town of Mount Gretna. The task involved creating a 4 foot by 2 foot painting, which was professionally photographed and printed onto a 20 foot by 10 foot UV-resistant vinyl wrap for installation onto the water tower. The objectives were to create a painting that conveys the magic of our unique town and our natural forested setting. The painting would include the Tabernacle in the Campmeeting neighborhood where the water tower stands. The Tabernacle has been a sacred gathering place for community members since it was constructed in the 1890s. We now gather there for concerts and other events throughout the summer.

“Gathering Place” was one of the most meaningful projects I’ve ever worked on, combining my love of our community with my passion for painting. This blog outlines some of the process steps and artistic decisions that went into creating the painting, as well as photos of the installation of the enlarged reprint onto the water tower. 

Photo 1 - “Gathering Place,” Oil Painting by Kathy Lindert, 48" x 24"

Initial Sketch & Basic Composition Decisions

I started the task in January with a digital sketch using Procreate Software to give a sense of the overall planned vertical composition, which conveys the community nestled into the forest. Key conceptual elements included the native rhododendron in the foreground, the Tabernacle and cottages in the middle ground (as the “Gathering Place” for the community), and the expanse of trees reaching to the sky. Dynamic compositional elements include horizontals, verticals, diagonals – and a reverse S-Curve following the path of light. All of the compositional elements were included to convey a sense of unity, harmony, and convergence.

I tested out the composition by overlaying the digital onto a photo of the water tower in Photoshop. This also raised the question of perspective and “eye level” since everyone would be viewing the painting from 30 feet below. With that in mind, I decided to adopt a “straight on” perspective, with eye level falling around the roof of the Tabernacle, and a slight downward tilt towards the rhododendron in the foreground and a slight upward look at the tallest tree “above” the Tabernacle.

Photos 2 & 3 - Digital Sketch for Initial Composition & Superimposed onto Photo of Water Tower

Painting Process & Artist Choices

Throughout the Spring and early Summer, I refined the composition with direct observation, sketching, and hundreds of photo references of various parts of the painting (Tabernacle, trees, plants, etc.). After numerous sketches (and some unrelated travel delays), I finally began the painting on May 20. Waiting until Spring to begin painting allowed me to capture the desired angle of light and lush greenery. The deadline for the painting was tight, so I painted about 8 hours a day for 48 of 50 days, finally completing the painting on July 5 after about 400 hours of painting time.

My approach to painting builds on an overall life philosophy that life is layered with many chapters – so are people; so is nature. Outward appearances are only part of the story. Beneath the surface, there is a myriad of experiences, emotions, chapters or seasons of life. What came before still transcends the present, though some aspects are more transparent while others are opaque. This philosophy translates into a painting process that builds up the painting through many layers, paying close attention to the properties of paint – in particular their opacity & transparency. 

I adapted this layered-painting process to meet the demands of the scene for “Gathering Place.” The painting evolved through many iterations, from basic blocking in of colors with a limited palette, to multiple full-color layers, to finer details. Every night I checked the “values” (darks and lights) of the painting by taking a black-and-white photo of the painting since value accuracy is fundamental for portrayal of the scene.

Photo 4 - Every night I would check for value accuracy with a black-and-white photo (June 24 version shown here)

In terms of color, although I tend to paint with a more limited palette of 8-12 pigments, for this painting, I expanded my palette to about 20 pigments plus Lead White to capture the full range of warm and cool colors that I felt were needed for the scene. I harmonized this broad range of colors by emphasizing a Triad Color Scheme of secondary colors often seen in nature: greens, oranges, and purples.

Throughout the painting process, I sought to check the painting “on the water tower” to see how the color scheme would “fit” with the structure and environment.  Obviously, I couldn’t climb up onto the actual tower, so most nights I would overlay a photo of the painting onto a photo of the water tower in Photoshop to simulate the fit. About midway through the process, I also physically brought the painting to the tower to cross-check the color scheme on site. It was particularly important to check the values and hues in the sky in relation to our notorious “water tower blue” hue that greets people as they come into town.

Photo 5 - My expanded palette (eye candy - so yummy!)

One of the techniques that I used throughout the painting is sometimes referred to as “broken color.” Colors are specific wavelengths of light reflecting off objects that humans can see. When light hits an object, it contains all visible spectrum of the colors of the rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple. The broken color technique in painting recognizes the effect of light hitting an object to generate this visible color spectrum. With this technique, rather than painting the local color of an object as a single hue, the artist applies a range of warm and cool versions of that local color in small strokes but does not blend them, so that they blend optically rather than physically. By allowing the viewer’s eye to blend colors together, this technique conveys the vibrancy, depth, and “sparkle” of light hitting an object. This method is widely recognized in impressionist paintings (see for example Monet’s haystacks or cathedral paintings). I have also found examples of pointillist broken color in Vermeer's works (such as in the sleeve of the sparkly "yellow" jacket in A Lady Writing). Two examples of “broken color” in the water tower painting are evident in the roof of the Tabernacle:

• The light areas. Rather than just painting it as a unform “orangey-brown” light hue, I used a range of hues, with some leaning more towards yellowy-orange (warmer), brown-orange, pinky-purply-orange (cooler).
• The cast shadows. Instead of painting the shadows a single “shadow color,” I alternated between warmer purples, cooler purples, and even blues and greens. This created more depth and the illusion of dappled light and shadow. In the process, I discovered a “magic purple” by mixing Gamblin’s Ultramarine Violet (transparent) and Old Holland’s Violet Gray (opaque), which I swear can be used anywhere to enhance shadows and transition colors with almost magical properties!

Photo 6 – Gathering Place, Detail: Broken Color Method for Light and Shadows (Plus Mama Cat and Other I Spy Critters)

Another prominent example of the “broken color” method is evident in the tallest pine tree (to right of composition). The goal was to go beyond depicting a tree but to capture the effect of the sunlight hitting the tree, to make it glisten in the sun. Rather than painting the tree as simply “green” (first photo), I used a range of greens (some warmer, some cooler) plus oranges, pinks, yellows in the light, and blues and purples in the shadows without blending them. This pointillistic approach makes the tree sparkle, giving the illusion of light hitting the pine needles with varying frequencies.

Photo 7 – Gathering Place Detail: Example of Broken Color on the tallest tree

A Playful Element: The Cats of Campmeeting and Seek & Find Game

An additional element entered into the painting relatively late in the process: an interactive Seek & Find Game featuring eight native critters. Mount Gretna is a tiny town, nestled into a dense forest, with no stop lights, a few restaurants, a volunteer fire department, a post office where we pick up our mail, and an estimated population around 800 full-time residents living in cottages surrounding our lake, which features a beach, rope swings, and diving boards. It’s also a mighty town, hosting an Outdoor Annual Art Show, over a hundred performing arts shows, a rich offering of Summer Programs, music-on-the-porch and soup cookoff events, an annual homes tour – all carried out through the active volunteering of the town’s residents.

It’s the kind of place where you not only get to know most people, but also the neighborhood pets. Many cats are free range, catching rays of sun on porches or prowling around the wooded pathways that are officially designated as “streets” in Google maps. Indeed, “Mama Cat” befriended me while I was sketching at the Tabernacle, so I decided to bring her into the painting in her happy place under the bench.

That prompted the idea to incorporate seven other native critters into the painting to create an interactive element for the community in the form of a Seek & Find Game. The plaque at the bottom of the water tower now lists the critters under the heading “I spy with my little eye, eight native critters way up high.” One of those critters, a Luna Moth, also links to another installation art sculpture by friend and neighbor, artist Ryan Fretz. Recognizing that the painting would be magnified five times for installation on the water tower, I used magnifying glasses and extremely fine brushes for these and other details in the last days of painting. See Photo 7 above to find Mama Cat, Luna Moth, and some of the other “I Spy” critters hidden in the painting.

Installing the Painting on the Water Tower

After 400 hours of painting, plus a layer of varnish, the painting was professionally photographed and color-matched by Old Town Editions, generating an extremely high resolution image. I then overlayed the text for the water tower version in Photoshop, using Greycliff font for the Mount Gretna text, Campanile TTF for the Campmeeting Logo, and Bodoni 72 Oldstyle for the historic 1892 reference.

A local team from Horst Signs then transferred the high-resolution image to a 20-foot by 10-foot Vinyl Wrap and installed it onto the water tower using a crane mounted on a truck. The installation process took about four hours – with many friends and neighbors looking on. We can always find a reason to celebrate in Mount Gretna!  ?? See link to drone video of installation below or under my videos page – it’s beautiful!

Photos 8 &9 – Installation of vinyl wrap expanded reproduction of the painting onto the Campmeeting Water Tower by team from Horst Signs on top of a large crane. They installed the wrap in sections, battling the buildup of water condensation on that hot summer day! Drone photo credits: Cory Smith, Visit Lebanon Valley

Photos 11 & 12 – Installation of vinyl wrap expanded reproduction of the painting onto the Campmeeting Water Tower by team from Horst Signs on top of a large crane. Friends and neighbors gathered to watch the installation process, which took about 4 hours. I got to go up in the crane when the installation was done! Literally a bucket experience!

Acknowledgements, Press Articles, & Drone Video

This project was one of several art installations commissioned in celebration of our town and county’s 2024 Year of the Arts, and was sponsored by the Mount Gretna Outdoor Art Show, the Lebanon County Commissioners, and the Mount Gretna United Methodist Church, with the support of the Campmeeting Board of Managers. Huge thanks to all for their support, in particular to Kerry Royer (Director of the Outdoor Art Show and project manager) and Pat Wilmsen (President of Campmeeting).

The water tower painting was covered in various press articles & videos, see links here:

=> Article in LebTown, by journalist & neighbor Margaret Hopkins: link here

=> Article in the Lebanon Daily News, by journalist Daniel Larlham Jr.: link here (bonus: check out photos from the annual mullet contest! Ya gotta love it!)

=> Breathtaking drone video by Cory Smith for Visit Lebanon Valley: link here and in my Videos Tab

Photo 12 – The painting now greets everyone coming into town on Pinch Road from the North.

It takes my breath away every time I see it. Grateful.