(Top) Airbrush artist, tattooist and mural painter Hillie Shirley adds careful sprays of color to his vintage postcard mural in progress on the side of Gladewater’s public restroom downtown.
(Above) Shirley has 17 years and dozens of murals under his belt, with multiple projects underway as he works on a wall-sized commission downtown for the City of Gladewater.
Frigid weather makes outdoor painting pretty frustrating, but Hillie Shirley bundled up and kept on working this week, focused on bringing a new mural to life in the center of downtown Gladewater.
“He’s doing a fantastic job,” City Manager Charlie Smith praised. “It blows my mind with how he does it.”
The most recent canvas for the veteran muralist, airbrush afficionado and tattoo artist is the community’s freshly-painted public restroom. The work in progress evokes a mid-century postcard with ‘Greetings from Gladewater’ and embedded artwork celebrating the different facets of the community.
“The mural was really Brandy’s idea,” Smith said, crediting Mayor Flanagan with capitalizing on the white-washed northern side of the railroad-adjacent building. “She showed me some other cities and the murals they have. We thought, man, that would be a fantastic theme for Gladewater.”
Shirley’s worked on 50-plus murals, most of them in Texas, including multiple projects around Gladewater. Seasonal window art is another specialty, and there are plenty of other large pieces on display at his tattoo storefront, Hillie’s Artwork at 110 S. Main.
It was a mural that actually got him into the tattoo business back in 2009 – another tattoo artist saw his large-scale work and invited Shirley to apprentice.
Murals bring a specific set of challenges, and each comes with its own hurdles for the commercial artist, reachable at 903-780-9343 or via Facebook.com/hillies.artwork
The frigid weather is frustrating Hillie Shirley’s work, forcing him to use a hair dryer to keep airbrushes functioning, but he’s bundling up and plunging forward, intent on turning out a picturesque image for the community.
“For one, you have to know what you’re doing,” Shirley says, and almost 17 years of experience helps. Likewise, “It’s based on my willingness and my mindset. You have to have that positive mindset, solution-oriented.”
The artist is grateful today that in learning to use an airbrush, he was taught to avoid stencils.
“I learned by messing up really a lot,” he quips.
Kicking off the local project around the New Year, it’s been slowed by the weather.
“I should’ve been done by now, and I’m not even halfway done,” Shirley lamented. “Everything is going against me right now. The weather’s the main problem. My airbrushes, I can’t get them to work in this – it takes me three or four times longer to use them.”
He’s pressed a hair dryer into service, using it to heat up an airbrush, getting about a minute of work out of each pass.
Not that those difficulties are showing in the realized artwork, though. With Shirley working days and nights, as well, the mural is showing steady progress, inspired by Gladewater’s past and present.
“He just runs with an idea,” Smith praised. “I think it really adds to the city and to our downtown area for sure.”