Taking art to the streets of Chattanooga (and beyond)
For over two decades, Kevin Bate has been delivering one tour de force after another. By organizing and painting a myriad of enormous murals, producing countless paintings in his Chattanooga Workspace studio, and involving himself in community-oriented projects, he has established himself as an influential artist and leader in the community.
All of his paintings, even the largest of his murals, begin with the same process. Using a photo as a reference, he draws the original images for his paintings by hand, sometimes using his studio window as a light box.
“I work very closely from the photos, I lean on them heavily, and I think for faces to be recognizable, you kind of have to.”
He prefers to work from high contrast photographs, because his style addresses light and dark, and the relationship between the two.
“I step away from a photograph, and squint at it—this reveals the lightest parts, usually in the bridge of the nose, the chin, the cheeks, where the light is coming from—I draw those,” he explains. “The darkest parts are usually under the nose, maybe under the eyebrows, under the hair, and I draw those. Then I basically work from those points back out—essentially making concentric circles around those light and dark parts, and bringing them together.”
He draws everything small at his desk, and transfers the drawing to his computer. He then takes the original drawing and projects it onto whatever surface he is painting, transfers it by sketching, and renders it with paint.
The resulting images are extremely lifelike and accurate, yet stylized and refined with a graphic quality.
Many think that he uses Photoshop, but as he tells us, “I’m actually kind of technologically illiterate. Everybody I know tells me that I could save myself a bunch of time, and do this in a couple seconds with Photoshop, but who’s to say what’s right.”
Bate is currently painting a mural for Cleveland that is being sponsored by the United Way of the Ocoee Region. The 30ft high by 90ft wide piece will depict famous people from Cleveland, the founding fathers, and people who have done good deeds in the community.
He’s painting the image in his studio on mural cloth. When it is done, he will take it up to Cleveland and install it by sticking the mural cloth to the wall with Nova Gel, like a giant wheat paste.
He is under contract with Dalton State College to do a mural (which is still in the design phase), putting together pieces for a show at Chattanooga Workspace in October, and a show at Creative Arts Guild in Dalton in November.
He has been commissioned to paint a monumental painting of a local family’s patriarch, and he just delivered some pieces to The Edwin Hotel.
“My name is getting out there enough where people contact me for projects,” Bate explains. “My wife and I had this plan when our son was little, when we were running around to daycare, that I would keep my work close in town. But as he started to get older, in first and second grade, I started to branch out, working in Dalton and Cleveland, and got hired to paint a mural at the airport in Huntsville, so I’m slowly growing.”
While his mural work expands to neighboring cities and beyond, Bate remains active in the local art community. He is deeply involved with the Ed Johnson Memorial Project, working to commemorate the memory of the man who was hanged on the Walnut Street Bridge in 1906.
“I was on the board for a year and a half, on the artist selection committee, and now I’m on the design review committee, working with the artist we picked, Gerome Meadows from Savannah,” he says. “I work with him on the design, and I hope to be part of the installation. I feel very strongly about this story—it isn’t something that needs to be swept under the rug for another hundred years.”
Bate is also working with Public Art Chattanooga, encouraging the city to access its native talent. “Hiring artists from other towns is like taking a quarter of a million dollars, putting it in a big catapult, and firing it out of the city. I’ve been pushing for more locally led projects from Public Art Chattanooga, and they are starting to come around. I’m excited about it, I hope they make it happen, and I want them to know that there are people here who want to help.”
Find Kevin online at goodwithfaces.com, or on social media @goodwithfaces