By LaRayne Topp

    A dollop of ice cream, maybe raspberry, melts down from the side of a building onto the pavement below while a gigantic hummingbird samples nectar from the petals of an overgrown purple zinnia nearby. A towering softball player in a red shirt and headband winds up her pitch, while life-sized players walk below. A colorful, configuration of a cornet band from 1904 appears ready to play, lined up at a grassy area near Main Street.
     All are within the imagination and skills of Gabe Perez of Pender, Nebraska, with as many talents as titles: muralist, graphic designer, and illustrator, to name a few. A Wayne State graduate with double majors in studio arts and graphic design, Perez experimented with various art styles—sculpture, pottery, painting, drawing and illustrating—until he based his majors and eventually a new business on what he enjoyed the most. Two minors—web design and social media marketing—are also useful as Perez lets folks know just what he can do.
    He began to show them by designing and painting several murals for the interior walls of a Fremont business; he branched out from there. Today his creations grace the interiors and exteriors of buildings throughout Northeast Nebraska, places such as West Point, Wayne, Wisner, Pender and Beemer.
    In all, during the last four years he’s completed 30-plus large murals in ten to fifteen towns, with outdoor work completed during the summer months.
    Before he begins, Perez meets with business owners and townspeople, depending on if it’s a mural for a particular business or if it will represent an entire community, to uncover what elements they might have in mind. From this range of ideas, he fashions several rough sketches, each expressing differing emotions, but typically including the history of a place.
    For example, a mural which graces the wall of the Wisner fire department has an emotional feel to it, Perez says, as it was designed to memorialize several department volunteers.
    At Two Blooms and a Bud in Wisner, Nebraska, owner Wendy Wemhoff was going for a Tuscan look for her flower and gift shop, she says: rustic yet elegant, classical but ornate. As a result, curlicues of blooming vines drape down from the roof of her building. Along one long side, a row of painted windows offer a panorama of the outdoors, each with a painted window box trailing more blooms. Overhead, words read, “If in doubt add flowers.”
    “My vision turned out beautifully,” she says. “Gabe brought it to life. I hope Wisner and the surrounding communities enjoy the mural.” She also hopes that it brightens their day.
    When Perez takes the small chosen sketch and transmits it to such a large area as the side of a building, he draws a “doodle grid” or lines on the wall, as close to the original rendering as possible. He then overlays one image on top of another, utilizing a paint sprayer for large areas, plus a plethora of cans of spray paint in various hues. He can paint wide lines or zero in on features as thin as a pencil line. The methods are his own, ones which he’s developed, he says, with “a lot of trial and error.”
    He particularly enjoys seeing the reaction of those who see his work for the first time. There are lots of comments of “I love it,” and sometimes viewers are overwhelmed, crying at what they see, Perez says.
    One time, however, someone called a local police department, thinking Perez was intent on vandalism. Perez had to call the building’s owner to talk to the policeman and let the force know he was legitimate.
    Perez’s favorite artwork is displayed at the sports complex in the town of Pender, Nebraska, also the location of his studio. On one side of the football field’s bleachers, a giant pitcher winds up for a throw, the Pender water tower looming in the background. On another side, a baseball has just been released by a looming pitcher. Between the two pitchers are life-sized players entering a make-believe doorway under a sign for Heyne Memorial Field.
    He also was able to utilize his creativity while designing an imaginative mural at West Point. The building’s owner left the design entirely to Perez, such that he added creative three-dimensional features such as honeycombs and ice cream melting from giant cones down onto the pavement below. In the process, he was able to utilize a number of new techniques. It was the first time, for example, that Perez used only spray paint instead of a brush.
    In Beemer, Perez worked with members of the town’s Community Club to design a mural to cover the length of a building, from the street front to the alley. The purpose of the Community Club is community betterment, and Club member Dana Steffensmeier feels Perez’s mural fits the bill.
    The prominent wall along Beemer’s Main Street was the perfect place to realize the goal of looking backward and forward at the settlement of the town. The mural incorporates scenes from Beemer’s past as a railroad town, bordered by cowboys and farmers, while moving forward to include its first settlers, school and churches, along with scenes of agriculture, and ending with a look at today, incorporating a soaring eagle and American flag.
    Perez worked with committee members as they brought in black and white photographs to incorporate into the design. He gave them a sketch beforehand, but when it went up on the building he included color.
    “He did an amazing job of making it look real,” Steffensmeier says, even contacting her to see if the purple of the Beemer Bobcats was “purple enough.”    
    Beemerites loved the results, she says. “It’s engaging to look at,” and also to watch the work in progress. Many from the area came by to watch Perez at work, including Steffensmeier’s two young sons. Perez gave the boys tips on how to create wide and narrow designs using only a can of spray paint.
    No matter if Perez has fashioned a mural for an individual’s home, a business, or a community, at the bottom corner he adds his signature and place to be reached—GabePerez@GabePerezArt--along with the year the artwork has been completed.
    Perez can also be reached at (402) 922-2076 or gabeperezdoesart@gmail.com.
    In his free time, or on days when it’s 100 degrees outside and too hot to work, Perez works on the Tri-City Comicon. Co-partnering with Wes Tjaden, the two stage the annual comic book and pop culture convention, held in the Grand Island, Hastings and Kearney area, and featuring comics, trading cards, toys, collectibles and original artwork. Perez and Tjaden prepare for it throughout the year, lining up artists, collectors and vendors.
    One can only imagine the touches of whimsy Perez will bring to that.