The shelf and glass were merely illusions.

In August of 1992 in Carmel, a woman attempted to walk into a stairwell at the Forge in the Forest tavern, only to hit a solid wall and fall to the ground with a minor head injury and cuts and bruises.

There was no stairwell--it didn't exist.

In the fall of 1998, at Victor Valley College in California, the school's librarian recounted numerous incidents of students reporting that a painting hanging on the wall was peeling at the corners and about to fall off the wall.

There was no painting.

What do these incidents have in common? They are all illusions, created by world-renowned trompe l'oeil muralist John Pugh of Los Gatos.

Trompe l'oeil (pronounced "trump loy") is a French phrase meaning "deceive the eye"--and that's exactly what John Pugh's murals do. Pugh takes ordinary mural painting a giant step further by creating visions that are so life-like--using techniques like perspective and realistic light, colors and shadows--that onlookers are tricked into believing what they are looking at is real, even when standing only inches away.

"The onlooker is tricked into believing that a surface is not flat, or that space exists where there is none," says Michele Witten, author and editor of The Whole Mountain Source Book, which featured an article in 2003 on the discipline of trompe l'oeil and Pugh's works. "One's first impression upon seeing a John Pugh mural is disbelief. Most people feel they actually need to touch the wall to prove to themselves that they are seeing what they really think they are seeing."

Pugh grew up in Walnut Creek and can recall many early childhood days spent experimenting with art.

"We all do finger painting, and my parents encouraged me," he says. "I think there's an age when school says, 'Stop doing art and start doing arithmetic,' or something like that. But my parents encouraged me to keep going."

Pugh went on to attend both San José State University and California State University, Chico, majoring in art. Up until 1978, he got many summer jobs doing carpentry--but in that year, he fell into a job that would prove to be the starting point for his lifelong, successful career creating murals.

"Someone was looking for someone to do a mural on the side of a country-western bar," he recalls. "I brought over a bunch of paintings I had done, and I got the job."

Pugh says the mural turned out to be a landscape with a 1960s sort of spin on it--an "ideal world" kind of feel. He says that style of art was very popular at the time.

That job led to others, and Pugh painted murals of that style for the next two to three years.

"I loved being outside, and I loved working life-size," he remembers. "And all artists need recognition, so working out in the public like that had its advantages."

Pugh's murals proved to be exactly what many businesses were looking for.

"That style of mural works well for corporations. It's like a free ad; it draws attention to [the business], but in more of a humanistic way," Pugh explains.

Pugh says for those reasons, many businesses found his works to be a good investment.

After a few years, Pugh stumbled into what he says was more of an architectural style of mural painting.

In 1980, while still a student at Chico, Pugh proposed a larger-than-life mural to the university, one that would take up the entire side of one of its buildings, Taylor Hall. Professors and school officials backed him on the proposal, and the powers that be eventually approved it. Pugh painted his mural from 1980 to 1981. He was paid a small stipend, and the project earned him class credit.

The Taylor Hall mural was Pugh's first public foray into the trompe l'oeil discipline. Academe, as it is called, depicts entire pieces of the wall crumbling away, to reveal a large hole that offers a peek as to what lies on the other side--a room full of ancient, Roman-style pillars.

Pugh's mural was so life-like, the university received a complaint from a woman who lived across the street, asking why the school had not done anything to fix the crumbling wall. Several other incidents were also noted of cars rear-ending each other in the adjacent intersection--their drivers apparently transfixed by the broken wall illusion.

Following his graduation, Pugh arrived in the Los Gatos area in 1984. One night he was enjoying a drink at the Black Watch bar on N. Santa Cruz Avenue when he found himself talking to Kevin Bruce. Pugh remembers the two enjoyed a lively debate that night about art.

What came of that night was a friendship that has remained strong to this day. Bruce went on to earn a master's degree in liberal arts from Stanford University and wrote his entire thesis on the murals of John Pugh and the history of trompe l'oeil art. Bruce has coined his own phrase to describe Pugh's unique style--"narrative illusionism."

"The reason his murals are so successful is that he combines trompe l'oeil with narrative storytelling," says Bruce.

Bruce is currently finishing up a book titled The Monumental Murals of John Pugh, which will be released by Ten Speed Press out of Berkeley and Toronto in spring 2006. The book tells an extensive history of the trompe l'oeil discipline, dating back to ancient Greece, and discusses Pugh's entire body of work.

In the introduction of his book, Bruce says there are two qualities that make Pugh's murals stand out above all others and explain his wide success. The first is his mastery of the art of trompe l'oeil, which attracts a captive audience to each of his pieces. The second is that his murals "offer a rich and rewarding viewing experience" and are "thought-provoking, substantial and sometimes even philosophical or spiritual."

Pugh has, indeed, made quite a name for himself over the past two decades, both nationally and internationally. The number of private and public murals he has been hired to create is too extensive to mention. However, locals don't have to travel far to see some of his creations up close--a few have actually made Los Gatos their permanent home.

One of Pugh's largest public works in Los Gatos is located on Main Street. Siete Punto Uno is similar to his first mural at Taylor Hall in Chico in that it depicts a huge portion of the wall on the outside of the building crumbling away, leaving a gigantic hole that reveals something very different inside the building--a piece of history. Inside appears to be a Mayan temple, including statues of Mayan jaguar gods that flank the temple's entrance. A woman touches the side of the wall as she peeks into the hole to see the temple, adding another vivid, 3-D element to the vision. This mural, created shortly after the massive Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989, is one of Pugh's oldest works and he's hoping to get it restored soon.

"Los Gatos was one of the communities that suffered the most significant damage from the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake," Pugh says on his website (www.artofjohn
pugh.com). "Considered the proprietor of earthquakes, the Mayan jaguar god, as represented in the mural, is grafted with the 'cats' of Los Gatos to become one of the key metaphors of this concept."

Another Los Gatos work is Woman in Café, which is located inside the Great Bear Café on N. Santa Cruz Ave. This mural creates an illusion by making it look as though there is an alcove in the wall with a counter for making or ordering drinks, and a young woman stands with her hands on the counter, looking out into the cafe, perhaps taking a moment's rest from work or waiting for a customer to help.

Yet another Bay Area work is the life-size Art Imitating Life Imitating Art Imitating Life at Café Espresso on Bascom Avenue.

This work makes it look as though the room is larger than it is, with a brick awning where strings of vines hang, leading to an open area. A statue sits at the area's imaginary left corner, and a staircase in a small alcove winds up around a hidden corner. An attractive woman bent over a table, engrossed in a book, completes the elaborate illusion. Reports have been made of men attempting to talk to the beautiful woman, but apparently she refuses to look up from her book.

Other Bay Area works include murals inside Mandarin Gourmet in Cupertino, works in the Stanford Shopping Center and at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation, a mural at El Camino Hospital at the Berryessa Community Center on Berryessa Road in San Jose.

These days, Pugh's plate is hardly empty. He has a number of private and public murals in the works, including a few local pieces coming soon.

He has already been approved by the Museums of Los Gatos to create a mural on the historical doors of the Tait Museum. The building was a fire station many years ago, so Pugh says the mural will be another peek into the past, allowing viewers to see what the fire station may have looked like back then.

"No one can get away without telling it used to be a firehouse--you can't cover up those doors," says Pugh. "The mural will show a peek of past activity--like the doors have been sealed up, but they magically re-open to reveal activity from decades ago."

Pugh says the inside peek will include a vision of firemen that used to work there, but who will be unaware that the doors are opening--only the fire station dog will notice the glimpse of the future as the doors open.

Pugh says his color sketch has been approved and the museum has gathered the necessary funds; he is now just awaiting a green light from the town to begin his work.

Another possible upcoming work in Los Gatos will be a historical mural on the wall in the restaurant and bar at the Tollhouse Hotel. With a big push by former Mayor Sandy Decker, Pugh has already met with Laura Bajuk, director of the Museums of Los Gatos, and many local historians to discuss the potential project. Pugh says this mural would illustrate an imaginary, formal gateway built into one of the Tollhouse's inner walls that will offer a look into Los Gatos' history--the fog-shrouded mountains and areas of Alma and Lexington, with apparitions in the fog that will depict past activities in the area.

"John, like so many other people in this town, is among many hidden treasures in Los Gatos which we can be very, very proud of," says Decker. "He has been willing to partner with so many community entities and is truly a gift. He is not only talented, but he is approachable and has an unbelievable vision, which translates into some of the most amazing works of trompe l'oeil I have ever seen."

Pugh is currently looking for a home for one of his murals, called Colonnade, which used to be displayed at the Michael Lane and Associates architectural firm in Los Gatos. When the building was demolished, Pugh removed the mural and is storing it in his studio--he says he actually creates the majority of his murals in his studio on canvas, which is later attached to walls like wallpaper. This allows him to move them if necessary.

Colonnade was brought out briefly to be displayed at the "Touch My heART" benefit held at the Testarossa Vineyards in February. Pugh says he hopes someone in Los Gatos will want to adopt the 16-by-16-foot mural, which depicts ancient columns in Italy.

"I'd like to keep it in Los Gatos," he says. "I think it deserves to be a part of the town's collection."

Pugh is also in discussions with Saratoga Mayor Kathleen King and the Saratoga Cultural Committee about the possibility of his creating a mural on the large wall of what is now Lupretto's deli, across from Bank of America in the Village. Pugh says the city of Saratoga and the cultural committee are working on securing more funding from private individuals and the Saratoga-Monte Sereno Community Foundation.

"I love John's work. We approached him because he's so world-renowned and his work is very top quality, and we feel that's what we want in Saratoga," says King. "I think all his work is very intriguing--quality and intriguing at the same time."

In addition to the project he's working on at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation, Pugh is working on projects in a Palo Alto home and in Santa Cruz, Phoenix and Anchorage. He lives in the mountains off Summit Road with his wife, Wendy, a physical therapist for cardiac rehabilitation.

All of Pugh's murals, which span more than two decades of his work, are available for viewing on his website, www.artofjohnpugh.com. The locations are also included, should anyone wish to seek them out and experience them in person.

Just be cautious--and don't walk into any walls.