Arts Connection students working with Sandra Moore are on the hunt for the perfect painted glass mosaic. To get there, they’ve been exploring line, design, color, and oil painting.
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Following are interviews with teaching artist, Sandra Moore and one of her prize pupils, Shawn.
Student Jaynelles work in progress
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Q.: Tell us about the process of going from line drawings to painted glass mosaics.
Matt works on mixing oils to get the right color relationship for his painting
A. (Ms. Sandy): We have started a line design project with the intention of instilling skills that will help facilitate designing and making the painted glass mosaic for the new school.
Our concept is to have it totally student driven. In order for that to be possible, first we need to teach them the skills of design and color theory. We began our first line design study by playing chess on paper. We took a big piece of paper. The first student drew a line on the paper. Then the next student had to react to the first line with another line. We continued that way until all the pieces were finished.
Q.: Why did you decide to work with the students with oils?
A. (Ms. Sandy): A big part of the art program here involves understanding color theory. I thought oil painting would be a great way to teach the students color theory because of how colors relate through the oil medium. Oils are more forgiving since you have more time to play around with them and blend them together. These students already have an innate sense about design, so oils seemed to be the next step.
Shawn and Brian work on their paintings
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Q.: So after the oil paintings, what comes next?
A. (Ms. Sandy): After they finish the oil paintings then we will start laying glass on windows to see what effects we get. We will work on a plan for the 20 window installation. All of the windows need to relate to each other in some way. So we’ll establish the design first and then fool around with color prior to laying down glass permanently.
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Q.: Shawn, what’s your past experience painting with oils?
A. (Shawn): This was my first time working with oils. I’ve never done any painting before. I like it, but it gets difficult making decisions about where to put which colors.
Shawns oil painting in progress
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Q.: What inspired your original design?
A. (Shawn): I wanted a line design but also wanted it to be different. So I put in specific shapes and lines. I mixed together free form shapes.
We used colored pencils for the sketch of the original design. I found the colored pencil palette to be more limiting. But in my actual oil painting I used colors that were unique.
