LAGUNA NIGUEL : Art Club Members Know Their AB Seas

Students and faculty at Niguel Hills Middle School took a hard look at the their hallowed halls this year and decided it was time for a make-over.

“We had all these blank walls and just thought we should do something about it,” said Nancy J. Davidson, an art teacher and director of the school’s art club. “It kind of snowballed from there.”

For the past six weeks, 14 art club members have been rolling up their sleeves, taking up paintbrushes and decking the walls of the Blue Commons area with a 70-foot-long mural of California’s ocean life in the style of famed marine artist Wyland.

Working with buckets of latex wall paint and posters of ocean life, the students, ages 10 to 14, have devoted every Thursday afternoon to creating portraits of ocean life native to California, from seals to orange garibaldi fish. The paintings are nearly life-size--except for the whales.

“People think it’s really radical,” said 14-year-old Anya Segers, one of the three students working on a picture of a blue whale. “It’s neat to know that you could come back in 20 years and it’ll still be here.”

The students first practiced on sheets of butcher paper, Davidson said. Then they went to the wall, painting the mural freehand, without any help from stencils.

“This is their work--they’re the artists,” Davidson said as she offered suggestions such as a little more shading here or there. “I don’t touch their work, I just guide them.”

The art club’s next project will be the wall of the adjacent Yellow Commons area. The plan is to paint a golden beach landscape of the California coastline.

After that, students say, they might put a tranquil forest scene on the walls of the administrative office in the very spot where youngsters accused of misbehaving wait to see officials.

“It will have a calming, subliminal effect,” Davidson said.