Guest Contributors: Hazel Hales & Charlotte Myers, Adventure Studio Learners
Adventure Studio was challenged to design and create a mural for the Session 6 Quest, based on the murals in Washington, DC. Although we faced challenges and obstacles, our mural exceeded expectations and we are proud to share it with the TVS community!
To start the Mural process, we took a field trip to DC, where we went on a Mural Tour. Studying these murals inspired a list of things that every mural has
- vibrant colors
- relatable to the location of the mural neighborhood/community
- really big
- represents something beyond – symbolic
We used this rubric, as well as input from the community, to create our designs. We split into three groups, each coming up with an individual design, and then combined them into the final design.
To start the painting process, we primed our masonite boards with two coats of primer (hoping to not get it on our clothes!), making it weather proof . And after two days of priming, we were ready to sketch!
Although mumbles of, “I have no artistic ability ” kept flying around, we were thankfully able to use a projector, projecting the image onto the boards and then trace the lines. This gave us a template to sketch it on the boards and would keep it proportionate. After finishing, we painted the entire thing with the first coat, and kept it up with the second and third coats, until week seven, when we finished and signed it.
This mural represents the journey of the learners and trailblazers, when they come to the Village School. There are many symbolic representations in our mural, and each message applies to our school.
The trees represent the growth of the learners as they move through the different studios, from Spark to Adventure. The caterpillar on the spark tree eventually turning into a butterfly on the Adventure tree serves the same purpose, representing growth. Next to the trees, there are symbols, a rose next to the spark tree represents a new beginning, the start of the hero’s journey. The apple represents discovery, since the apple that fell on Newton’s head led him to discovering gravity. The compass represents adventure, because of it being a necessary traveling tool, leading adventurers to their final goal, and destination. And the spirals on the sun and trees represent the journey, a cycle of accepting a call, embracing challenge, and learning important lessons.
Ms. Carrie, our Artist in Residence, was an essential part of this project. She provided us with materials and gave us guidance as we chose colors, size, placements, and how to fix mistakes, so shout out to her!
Before this Quest, a lot of us thought that we couldn’t draw very well, and that we were bad at painting. But, we’ve all grown in our understanding of art, artistic abilities, and ability to work together, and we made something that we’re all proud of.
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