Enikő Váczy has created a special piece of art for the interior wall of a café, showing the symbiosis of decorative painting and nature. The creation of the decoration took her back to her childhood days of experimenting and making montages, like an art therapy process.
The owner of the café wanted a particularly cheerful and exciting mural. The inspiration came from street art pieces that add an element of nature to create a complete picture, such as a face painted under an ivy-covered wall.
The work evokes this atmosphere in the In Zuzu Cafe, which is located in Budapest in the 13th district Szabolcs utca 22-24, which is also a dog-friendly place. Enikő's boyfriend József Balázs also contributed to the making of this photo.
The part of ‘painting’ with lichen, i.e. composing images, was originally unimaginable Enikő, eager to get her hands on this new medium! She spent days sorting through the lichen spheres and flat mosses to order the many different types. He also added dried flowers and eucalyptus leaves here and there. He fixed the lichens with special glue that dried slowly, for about a day. The lichen picture itself was made on plywood, which Joseph cut into the shape of hair with decorative paper and he transported the finished lichen picture by bicycle through the City Park and fixed it on the spot.
Enikő often gets that 'you must have a lot of patience when you are seen making murals by passers-by'. If anything, I needed that certain chill mindset to make a lichen picture. At the same time it took me back to my childhood days of experimenting and making montages, like an art therapy session.
When Eniko was approached by the owner of the café, it was about artificial flowers. Eniko is personally repulsed by artificial plants, she sees no point in them unless they are on the handlebars of a bicycle. 😀 That's why they went for this solution, which they say looks much more natural and is quite durable (about 10 years for a picture like this).
The dimensions of the whole picture are about 3.5m high and 2m wide, of which the lichen part is about 1.5 m2. It took about 6 kilos of moss/leaf moss. The painting was completed in about a week, including the mural painting, lichen sorting and material procurement.
Enikő would love to do more paintings like this in the future!
