The Bowen Island Community School Eco Mosaic Project was an initiative supported by Arts Starts, an organization that encourages education through the arts, through the Bowen Island Community School (BICS). The project was conceptualized and organized by artists Bill Hoopes and Gerold Morrisseau and carried out by all 308 students in grades K-7. Ongoing support from the school principal, Jennifer Pardee , and the Community School Coordinator Sarah Haxby, were critical to the success of the project, as was the general support of the school staff.

 

 

The project began with a visit to classrooms in the spring of 2014. Bill presented a history of mosaic making and then the artists spent time discussing how to draw and also how to see the things the students observe in their environment. There was a discussion about the various plants and wildlife present on Bowen Island and their life cycles that they had been studying in class. The students were then asked to do drawings relevant to the life cycles that they found particularly interesting. Bill and Gerald aided the students to realize their ideas in drawing. The students were then given a week to refine their concepts and the final drawings were handed over to the artist team to be used as a basis for the final design of five, 12” X 40.5” panels which would be mounted into prepared inlays in the benches at the school’s Outdoor Learning Center.

 

 

The artist chose to create images of the life cycle of salmon, frogs, butterflies, eagles and dandelions. We designed black line and colour drawings of each and enlarged these to fit the parameters of each panel. Boards covered with the enlargements, plastic sheeting and tile mesh were then assembled and the students filled the contours with glass tile which corresponded to the colour designs.

 

 

 Although many different approaches to mosaic art have been developed, the processes employed in the current project were selected with consideration of the safety of the student participants. Specifically, concerns about bringing corrosive materials used in many approaches in the creation of mosaic into the classroom lead Bill to develop a method that was not only safe but would  also facilitate easy clean up and weekly storage of the project until the time of its installation. Working on smaller sections also afforded students easy access to the work surface in the classroom.

 

 

Three hundred and eight students from fourteen classrooms K-7 participated in the setting of the tiles. By the end of the first week it was apparent that there was not going to be enough work to go around so the artists designed an additional panel 20” X 96”. The theme for this piece was the Orca whale which has only recently returned to Howe Sound.