The talents of art students at North Star High School is now on display in a lounge area near the school’s main office.
A new mosaic mural was officially unveiled Friday afternoon after being completed by art students in Grade 9 through Grade 12. Art classes taught by Samantha Thomas and Andrea Craig-Wammes carried out the work with the help of local potter Alice Welsh.
“They did a wonderful job,” said Welsh. Walsh noted the students had to work with glaze, which is not always easy as the colours can change when painting it. She said she saw an idea for such a mural, then brought it to Thomas.
Thomas and Welsh are connected through their families’ ties to pottery. Welsh said she has been potting since 1966.
“I think they did a great job,” said Welsh of the students.
Thomas said Welsh had an idea to collaborate between Western Secondary School and General Amherst High School to help us transition to North Star.
Between the pandemic and the move to the new school, the project was delayed but has now come to fruition.
“We were to come up with a design and split it up into individual tiles to create a mosaic piece all put together in the new building,” said Thomas. “Sloane Percy, a Western student made the original digital drawing. Tyler Charron, a former Western Student and current North Star student, improved the drawing and made a painted version that we used to create our mural.”
Thomas said she added a grid and broke it up into 96 different tiles.
“Last year, our art students all painted their portion of the mural onto clay tiles made by Alice Welsh. Alice also help Andrea Craig-Wammes and I mix the colour needed for the glaze (paint for ceramics). We painted them in the art room and then Alice took them all back to her studio to fire in the kiln,” said Thomas. “The collaborative outcome was amazing.”
Charron said her painting took about seven days to complete while the mural was done in roughly one month.“It’s mind-blowing,” said Charron, in seeing the final product.
Grade 12 student Kari McKeown added she was also pleased with the result.
“It’s pretty rewarding,” she said.
By Ron Giofu
North Star Students Create Mural
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