MS Kalakala leaving
Port Angeles Harbor
Actual size, 72' long - 25'
high, artist's acrylic medium
by Cory Ench
©1995
This Mural was painted in the summer of 1995 and depicts the Kalakala, a well known and one of a kind ferry boat which for many years did summer runs from Port Angeles to Victoria , B.C. It was mainly stationed in Seattle and was one of the main attractions in Seattle before the construction of the Space Needle. The Kalakala was built in the early 1930's and designed by Boeing who gave the boat its futuristic Buck Rogers appearance. Retired in 1973 and moved to Alaska where it became a fish processing plant it was left to decay on dry land until 1998 when the Kalakala Foundation in Seattle managed to get it afloat and bring it back to Seattle. Now this legendary ferry is being repaired and will once again be an attraction in Seattle. |
This mural also serves as a backdrop for the main music stage at the annual Arts in Action Street Fair held each summer in July. The children who sit along the ledge in front of the scene are intended to look like part of the crowd during the street fair. The brick and columns on the ends of the mural are painted on to match the rest of the building's architecture. |
The children hanging out on the ledge in front of the scene are dressed in present day clothing. The idea was to make them look as if they are sitting in front of the mural instead of part of it. |
When the street fair music stage is set up it is almost the same height as this illusionary ledge. The children then look like they are sitting at the ends of the stage especially in the afternoon when the painted shadows match the real ones. |
Little details like the shoes and their shadows add to the illusion