Mosaics Celebrating the Erie Canal

Mosaic Triptych

In the fall of 2016, I had another opportunity to work with fourth grade students on a mosaic project. This year our subject, also going along with local history, was the Erie Canal. For this project, the students looked at historical photos of the Erie Canal in fort Plain, NY. They chose three photos in which to be the subjects of their mosaics. There are three 4th grade classes and this year they chose to create a triptych. Each class worked on one piece of the triptych.
After the photos were selected, I enlarged them and made a mosaic cartoon.

This is one of the mosaic cartoons for the mosaics.

The students worked on the mosaics from October through December 2016. I prepared the tesserae for each section of the mosaics and outlined each area with the tesserae to be used in that section. This gave the students a guide to the way the tile would be placed. Almost like color by number.

This is the Erie Canal Store. This building no longer exists in this location. It was disassembled and brought the the New York State Museum for reassembling. But recently, it was moved back to Fort Plain for reassembling and will be on display at the Fort Plain Museum.

This piece is the aqueduct, part of the Erie Canal, located in Fort Plain, NY

This mosaic depicts the lift bridge, once located in Fort Plain, but is no longer in existence. The lift bridge is similar to a drawbridge, except that it lifts in one piece, to allow canal boats to pass under, rather than raising in two pieces like a drawbridge.

The three mosaics look beautiful. They will be displayed together, like this at Harry Hoag Elementary School in Fort Plain, NY

For more information and photos go to:

http://fortplain.org/District/District%20News/1617/161213_Mosaic_artist.htm

This project was made possible by Saratoga Arts and New York State council on the Arts

Finished Mosaic

The Fort Plain Mosaic is complete

The Students of Harry Hoag Elementary School, Fort Plain, NY did a wonderful job completing this mosaic.

Fort Plain Mosaic

Finishing!

On my last visit, we working on finishing the mosaic. The students worked diligently and were so focused on the project…I was impressed!

It is coming along beautifully!

Here I am, working with some of the students.

Great progress has been made!

The mosaic is almost complete. The students will finish this during their art class and then I will grout it. I will be using two colors of grout, charcoal and medium gray.  In these photos, the tile edge is taped off to protect it from the glue and keep it clean. This was one of my biggest challenges…9 year olds have difficulty controlling the adhesive…too much, too little, sometimes more on top of the glass and not enough on the bottom. For this reason, I will be using an epoxy grout because it has adhesive qualities.

Fort Plain Mosaic

My Third Visit

I prepared more glass for my next visit. This was mostly background material. During this time, the kids learned about andamento or flow, for example, the boat shape pieces used to create flowing water in the fountain. The sky was simply triangle fill.

This was a great lesson in thinking and planning for the students. They really had to think about how one piece will affect the next. They could see when they left a small gap, it would be difficult to fill it in with another piece of glass. 

Continuing the Fort Plain Mural

Our first day of mosaic

Here is the start of the mosaic. The glass was precut for the students, they are very young, 4th grade! I cut the glass for specific areas of the mosaic, labeled each piece for placement, the taped the pieces to a piece of cardboard. I bagged the smaller pieces. Then I brought it all to Mrs. Slaweinski's Art Room at the school, where I worked with 6 to 8 students at a time to put the mosaic together.

The kids were so excited about working on this and their excitement grew as the mosaic came together and they were able to visualize and recognize the historic sites of their home town.

At the day's end, I left the unfinished mosaic in the capable hands of Ms. Slaweinski. She continued the work with the students until my next visit.

An Exciting New Challenge

My Introduction to the Fort Plain Mosaic Project

In June of this year, I was contacted by Harry Hoag Elementary School in Fort Plain NY, to work with the fourth grade student on a grant project. The students were to select historical sites from the area and work with me to create a design that would become the groundwork for a mosaic that will be on display in their school. 
On my first visit to the school, I worked with students on choosing historical landmarks for the mosaic and teaching them about mosaic. Most of the children did not even know what a mosaic was. After showing the kids some mosaic pieces, a slideshow where they could see different styles of mosaic, and demonstrations on how to create a mosaic, the kids were bubbling with enthusiasm!!
I went home with a list and photos of some historical landmarks in Fort Plain, that the children thought were important and with their suggestions, I created a design that would make their vision come to life.

Sketch for the Fort Plain Historical Mosaic

Covered Bridge, Bridge over Mohawk River, Fountain at Center of Town,

The Public Library

Cordelia

I am calling this piece Cordelia...I think this Victorian style name is fitting for her!

CORDELIA

Here are some detail photos...

Back to Work Again!

This piece has been a real trial. After the background was grouted...I was stuck, didn't know where to go with it. and I wasn't really happy with the grout. So I just put it away for the winter, I brought it out again in the spring, cleaned it up a bit. The grout was a bright white and I found that to be distracting, I didn't want to go with black so I decided to paint the grout gray. Even then I wasn't sure what I was going to do with the rest of it. This piece has a lot going on. It is meant to be a busy piece, but I still wanted flow and a pleasing composition. So it sat most of the summer where I could see it. I studied it and it was on my mind often...just trying to figure out how to make this work.

So I continue.....adding beaded patterns and mille.

I'm starting to like this...it's coming together and feeling like my Zentangle inspired drawings.

I'm starting to get really excited about this now. I really like where its going!!

Here, I have added her head and started on the hair.

Now, she is coming to life! I have added more hair and added details to her arms and legs.

She has a doll like quality that I like...a bit creepy too!

Stay tuned for the completion of this interesting lady!!!

Slate as Muse Art Opening

My Mosaic, "What Lies Within" was accepted in the Slate as Muse Art Show at the Slate Valley Museum in Granville NY.

"What Lies Within"

The opening was amazing. It was so interesting to see the art inspired by slate. There were beautiful pieces using art as a medium and also paintings and photography inspired by slate.

Slate as Muse Opening

This is me with my piece!

This is a "must see" show!! It runs through November 7, 2014. 

It's also a great time to tour the museum and surrounding sights!

It's been a While!!

I took a break from my zentangle piece for the winter. This piece is rather large and it is much easier to work on it outside...my workspace, inside on my dining table is rather small. So stay tuned for pictures soon to come.

Doodle Inspired Mosaic

Here is the beginning of my Zentangle or Doodle inspired mosaic.

This section, black tiles, stacked like brick, but square, I added these great accent beads.

Here I added a border, looks a bit zipper like.

This will be the area below the ground line, the small glass pebbles, will appear to be the dancer's shadow.

Zentangle, Doodling, Random Drawing...it's all about pattern and design, drawing what you feel, spontaneously. I attempted to plan out my patterns, but I couldn't get it to work with the mosaic. So I just started...randomly laying in pattern.

Black and White

My Inspiration

I like to doodle. I love to draw patterns and shapes just to create wonderful, whimsical composition. I have done this for years...in high school on my notebooks and yes, even sometimes on the desk. I have discovered that this doodling has a name, trademarked, Zentangle. So, I guess this is what I do...or my art is Zentangle inspired.  I call it doodling with style!

These "tangled or doodled" dancers are the inspiration for my next mosaic.

I enjoy creating these fun lively dancers, each with her own personality. 

These "Zentangled" or doodled dancers were actually inspired by some of my previous mosaic dancers.

Sunshine

This is a journey, I have realized that my dancer's are evolving, the inspirations come from one to create another...but that will be fuel for a new topic!

My vision is to create a mosaic, a dancer, using black and white, to create patterns that will make her come alive....stay tuned!

What Lies Within

I apologize for being absent for so long. But here is my finished piece, created out of stained glass on mirror and slate.

This piece looks amazing when the light cause the glass to flash and reflect these brilliant colors!

Slate and Stained Glass Abstract

Quite a few years ago we had the old slate roof taken off our house and put a new roof on. I saved some of the old roof shingles, think I would use them for ....something....
Finally, I decided to use the shingles in combination with mirror and stained glass to create an abstract piece. And Yes, I am inspired my artist Helen Nock!!!

I broke up the shingles and laid them out so they looked as though it was one large piece that was breaking apart. I put mirror down where the cracks between the slate is. On the mirror, I used small pieces of stained glass of different bright colors. The mirror reflects through the glass beautifully.

I love the contrast between the brilliant, reflective colors and the rough, gray slate.

The slate is not glued down yet, but I like to lay it out as I'm working to get a feel for what the final piece will look like.

This glass reminds me of candy....when the light reflects the mirror under the glass, it looks so brilliant, coming through the slate pieces.

More to come soon.

En Avant!!!!!!!

It's been a long process and there were times I thought I'd never complete this project! But here we are finished at last!  

The next step is the delivery to the National Museum of Dance in Saratoga Springs, NY.  There it will be photographed along with the other 24 pointe shoes and set up for the Unveiling on May 31st. This event is open to the public.

En Avant

This will be displayed this summer and fall at the

Saratoga Performing Arts Center

Saratoga Springs, NY