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Mosaic mural promotes understanding

June 17, 2007 12:35 am

By LAURA L. HUTCHISON

Starting tomorrow, weather permitting, a group of young people will be zipping around a floral green landscape like so many bees.

And they need your help.

Months of work will culminate this week when the members of the MOREart! team begin installing a 31-foot-wide, 8-foot-tall mosaic mural on the back of a warehouse building at Roxbury Farm and Garden Center in Fredericksburg. The mural will be visible from Jackson Street.

Volunteers are needed to help install the artwork.

The art team is part of the Multicultural OutReach Effort, a group dedicated to promoting diversity and understanding in the community.

At the final off-site MOREart! meeting last week, the students and organizers were excited about seeing their hard work pay off.

"We are amazingly proud of you all," said Suzanne Moe, coordinating the project with fellow artist Andrea Shreve Taylor. "You have come so far. You might not realize it until you're out at the site, but it's awesome."

In weekly meetings since February, the nine students and Moe and Shreve Taylor have been creating pieces of the mosaic indoors. This week, those 20 finished blocks of the piece will be attached to the wall, and the background--including thousands of blue tiles in five shades--will be created on-site.

The mosaic contains 23 different colors, plus mirror shards and black and white glass pieces that look like flattened marbles.

MOREart! team members, who have spent months learning the art of mosaic, will become the teachers this week, instructing volunteers on how to smash tiles, how to fit the pieces together again and how to permanently affix them to the wall.

"You've been learning how to do it," Moe said last week, "experiencing it, and probably getting a little bored with it."

"Mmm hmm," the students replied.

"Now you are going to be the teachers," Moe said. "You're going to have an opportunity to meet people in the community and tell them about this project, and help them become a part of it."

The students already have done some teaching, when MORE board members visited the art team last month.

"I've been aware of these students' talent for some time," said Marci Catlett, a Multicultural OutReach Effort board member and assistant superintendent for instruction and personnel in Fredericksburg schools. "It's an excellent experience for them to branch out from the classroom and produce this artwork. They're working together, giving back to the community, with a theme of peace, goodwill and diversity. So many lessons are being learned."

The MOREart! team will be at Roxbury from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. tomorrow through Friday, weather permitting.

Volunteers can come for any amount of time they're willing to give, and people of all ages are welcome. However, anyone under 18 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian. Volunteers must wear closed shoes and sunscreen, and hats are recommended.

Volunteers will have an opportunity to do anything from smashing tiles to gluing them to the wall to helping hold in place the 20 large pre-completed sections as they're attached to the wall.

Moe said the group also could use donations of old towels, rags and plastic containers.

Financial contributions also are being accepted, to help pay for the $13,000 project.