Jaffrey’s artwork brings music to life

Work is progressing smoothly on the new mural on the side of the FiveOne8 building at Fourth and Reed streets.
A little more than a week ago, the mural was laid out, and Valley, Neb., artist Jenna Jaffrey has been busy at work bringing the mural to life. Jaffrey said it was ironically injury that led her to artistic pursuits.
“I tore my ACL as a kid in my knee, and I was heavy into sports when it happened. I was benched for quite some time. I’ve had six ACL surgeries since that injury. I was looking for something to do on my extra time and I took an art class in high school. I think it was my sophomore year, and it was game over,” Jaffrey said.
Her initial artwork, Jaffrey said, tied into the fact that she was heavy into sports herself.
“I was painting sports-related things. I believe around that time I came across Leroy Neiman’s work. He painted impressionist sports, horse racing. They’re very loud, very colorful and I really took a liking to his work. It was pretty much an independent study at that point, and I just painted, and painted,” commented Jaffrey.
While she’s done a lot of painting in the Nebraska area and Council Bluffs, Jaffrey said it was a lucky scroll through Instagram that led her to seek out the opportunity to paint the FiveOne8 mural.
“I saw the call for art. I went to their website and in between a few submittals it crashed, so I had another artist, Sharon Manhart with Arbor Street Studios, who painted the large train mural on the building at the corner of north Second and Coolbaugh streets. She actually ended up being the catalyst to connecting us and saying, ‘Hey, this is Jenna and she was trying to reach out to you.’ The next day I heard back from them. And they told me they would love to see a design and were about to apply for the funding, so we needed to get it in quick,” Jaffrey explained. “I designed this right off the bat. I felt, you know, with their guidelines of we want it colorful. We want ‘inspire’ to be the rainbow letters. We want music. We want art instruments in the back. With art instruments in the back. With those four prompts, I was able to come up with a piece and sent it over and they said you got it. So, it was a fairly straightforward process.”
Jaffrey said the mural’s design will have a tie into the FiveOne8 and its penchant for hosting live music on a regular basis and hosting area artists and their work.
“It has a guitar, a trumpet, drums, and a large paint palette and pencils. It was a challenging design because there’s so many instruments, so many art supplies. I was able to pull from reference photos and kind of puzzle it in There’s also sheet music which everyone was really in favor of. Initially, the sheet music ended down in the middle, and you were supposed to imagine the carry off. When they chose the design, they said they wanted it to wrap the building. You’re going to see a bit of both worlds in art and music,” said Jaffrey. In the doorway on the side of the building, it will have a silhouette of a guitar player. It’ll be a nice little segue to the personal part of the piece, as the silhouette will be the size of a person, versus everything else that is larger than life. It’s something a little smaller, more intimate. You can come right up to it. “
Jaffrey also described the process for setting up the mural to be painted along the wall.
“I have the main design in a color palette, and then I take that design and I overlay it and I have to resketch it all into just a black and white outline sketch. That got projected on the wall It’s it’s got the meat of the mural. About 70% of what’s in the mural has been already lined out, and I’ll be hand-painting the rest of it in. As I put the color in, that’s when you kind of see a little bit more detail come to play, but it’s all digital sketches until this process.”
While she’s painted around eight murals, Jaffrey said this is one of her biggest projects.
“This will be my second largest project. My largest is in Council Bluffs. That was about a 450 foot stretch of a nine foot fence, totaling more than 3,000 square feet. I’ve been up on lifts. I’ve been on the ground doing big stuff. But this one is very unique, I will say, with the mortar and the brick. Also, I have to go slow and there’s a carry over on the top. It’s not just a flat palette. You really have stuff to work around. And it does make a big difference when you decide to carry one edge over and we’re going to go way to the top with the paint palette. When you have a whole building with obstacles to work around, it gets really fun and challenging as well,” stated Jaffrey.
Even though it has its challenges, being able to have such a large canvas for her work is an immensely rewarding opportunity.
“There’s nothing better than that feeling. It’s a little intimidating when you first walk up to it. It always is for me. All of my murals range in size, and are exterior and interior. When you walk up to it after it’s been primed, and it’s just a big white canvas, you look at it and think wow, I got a lot of space to cover. Day one was all about working out the kinks, seeing what brushes worked the best, and determining what colors needed to be laid first. It’s all laying the groundwork for the rest of the project and getting a rhythm for it. Day one went slow but well, and since then, we’re rocking and rolling,” advised Jaffrey.
Jaffrey has been getting some painting assistance from Red Oak’s Jim Hoskinson and others. When working on a large project, Jaffrey said it’s better to have a helping hand and that without it, the project could take a couple of months. In addition to the reward of having her artwork on display, Jaffrey said she also appreciates the kind words she’s heard from people stopping by to speak to her as she paints.
“It’s the reason I do what I do. I question every time I do a mural, why do I do this? This is hard on your body. It’s a lot of work, a lot of loading and unloading. And then the minute you feel that reaction from the public, it’s just, it makes it so worth it. The best compliment I got was a few days ago was from a little girl walking down the sidewalk with her dog and her mom. I was up on the lift with my assistant, and she saw my hair peeking out of the helmet, and she went, ‘Whoa, is that a girl up there?’ And I turned, and I’m like, this is your moment. You’ve got to take these moments as they come. And I turned and I said, ‘Hey,’ and waved at her, and said, ‘yes, I’m a girl. It could be you one day, too,’” commented Jaffrey. “It’s all about inspiring the youth. It gives you no greater feeling when reactions like that happen, especially from younger children, because a big reason why I do what I do is to inspire them as well.”
Overall, the weather has cooperated with the project, and aside from one day called for rain, she’s been able to work in cool days to begin the project and warmer days as it nears the end. Once the mural is completed, Jaffrey said she will spend a half a day putting on clear coat for additional sun protection.
In addition to loving the compliments as she’s been painting, Jaffrey said she’s very happy to be here and she loves this town.
“I’ve grown to love it quite a lot. Everybody has been extremely welcoming. If I feel that I have that support, if I feel that the community is starting to take it in and enjoy the work that I’m doing, that makes my job a lot easier in a way. There’s a part of you that kind of stresses in the back of your head, ‘is this what they wanted? Is this what will be viewed the best?’ And that’s after going through four or five rounds of designing, trashing one design, trashing the next, and so on. So to have picked a design, finalized it, and then moved on, and seeing that everybody’s receiving it well, it’s a great feeling, and once again, is a big part of what I do. It also it makes my job here a lot more loving and easy,” Jaffrey advised.
Now that she’s had her first experience here in Red Oak, Jaffrey said she would welcome the opportunity to return.
“I think I met someone who might want me to come back already, so we’ll see. But I would absolutely come back. I need to get out of Omaha more and bring my work other places. This is actually my first travel job for my own murals. I’ve done some assistant work on others, but this is the first time I’ve been out of town, and it feels really good,” Jaffrey stated.