Throughout the school year the Grade 4/5 class have been focusing on the environment and helping the Earth. I have been collaborating in Fine Arts along with Miss Johnson on our Plastic Ocean unit. In the fall, we were presented with the wonderful opportunity to work with two local community artists, Dan and Marina at their Hub studio to have students create individual pieces within their salmon mural. This project fit perfectly into our classroom visions, as it raises awareness around the diminishing numbers of local salmon and the rise in pollution in the Thomson River. Our initial visit to the studio happened at the beginning of the school year. There, students were able to see the beginnings of the mural and understand the important message it will share to the viewers. Marina shared her vision for the mural, emphasizing the importance of the salmon to our people, why they are such sacred animals and how our pollution is affecting the number of salmon returning to our waters. The mural is meant to promote change, for us to do our part to keep our river clean of plastics, metals, garbage and pollutants to help save the salmon. Sometimes people don't always listen to words, sometimes looking at artwork Each student was given the task of coming up with a design that would be inside of their glass bubble. The kids were asked to think about why the river and the salmon are significant to them, their lives, and their community. They all needed to consider and meet the challenge of working in the small space of the bubble. Each glass piece is only about the size of a bottle cap. During our fine arts time, students experimented with ideas and created designs that they could use for their bubble. Next, they choose their best design and copied it very carefully onto the back of the glass bubble using permanent marker. Students delivered their finished bubbles to Marina and Dan in December and were very excited to get to see them placed inside the mural on our next visit. Today was our final visit to the studio to see the [almost] finished mural. I was blown away by how stunning it looks with all the colours, textures, details, and the beautiful driftwood frame that was found on the river shore. Within the frame is even a salmon fossil that is 40, 000 years old! The pollution - pieces of metal, glass and plastics are all found items from the river. The students, and myself are all very excited to find out where the mural will be installed in community. Our next task is to write an artist statement about our glass bubble artwork to be shared with the mural unveiling. We are SO fortunate to have such talented and passionate people willing to work with our school community to create this beautiful and important piece of art that will displayed within the community for many years to come!
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