Vinyl Mascot Mural
Benny Beaver is the mascot of Oregon State University, and back in 1981 "Bernice" was introduced as well to act as Benny's counterpart. In 1998 Bernice was no longer used, and for over 20 years her presence was not acknowledged. In 2024, however, it was decided to bring her back, as a mascot and as a counterpart to Benny once again. With this re-introduction, it was requested to create a mural outside the LaSells Stewart Center depicting Bernice and Benny together. I had the pleasure of illustrating the two of them leaning in for a kiss, and got the extra experience of seeing how a vinyl mural can be applied to the outside of a building.
The mural is lifesize, and includes the hashtag #Benny&Bernice for people to take their picture with and tag on social media. The location is across from Reser Stadium, and would be a fun location for folks to take pictures with. The spacing of the vinyl was deliberate, to allow for guests to stand between the two, as if Benny and Bernice are kissing the person getting their picture taken.
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Making the mural out of vinyl instead of paint has many advantages - it is able to withstand the rainy weather of Oregon, and can be removed and replaced after a certain amount of time. There is the risk of guests defacing any art on campus like this, so if ever that were to happen, we could simply replace it. Luckily, after 6 months of being placed, we still have not seen anyone deface or damage the vinyl.
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Below are some images of the process. First is my initial sketch of the plan for the illustration, which I turned into a vector with Adobe Illustrator. This way it could be scaled to any size without the worry of pixelation. The second image is in the process of being mounted. We could place them and visualize the correct distance before being "locked in" to the vinyl being stuck to the wall.
There have been a lot of fun images that have come out of fans posting images to social media, below are a few examples. If you ever find yourself in the area, go ahead and give them a visit!
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