Wiregrass Mosaic Project - Troy University

On Sunday October 10, and Thursday October 15, I led 4 free mosaic workshops at Troy University Campus in Dothan. October is a gorgeous month in Alabama, and we were working under a tent graciously installed there for the occasion by the University Staff.

Our goal with this project  is to demonstrate the technical feasibility of community mosaic projects by quilting together a great number of small individual mosaics.

Altogether, about 40 people came to enjoy the cutting and laying of tesserae on a mesh.

We had one 3 hours session on October 10, and three 2 hours sessions on October 15.

There were only 2 patterns proposed for these 2 first sessions.  A Traditional Roman geometric one : 

And a Malta / St Andrew's Cross

We actually spent 9 hours tiling and produced 56 individual brightly coloured 6 x 6" mosaics.

The individual pieces at the Library.

The next stage of the project will be the installation of these pieces on the rectangular table and benches in the park.

After that, we will have more sessions to realize the mosaics needed to cover the Round tables and benches. 

We need your help for the next stages !

If you would like to help and participate, or learn more about this Project, please contact :

• Donna Miller by email at dmiller@troy.edu or by phone at (334) 983 6556 ext 1321, or

• Frederic Lecut (me) by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639

 

I am a modern mosaic artist with a deep admiration for ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Arts. You can see my own mosaics on my site at mosaicblues.

 

If you are interested by my work or would like to drop me a line please contact me by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639. 

 You can also

(and I recommend it !)

SUBSCRIBE to my

NEWSLETTER

If you liked this post, please forward it to a friend. 

If you did not like it, feel free to forward it 

to your ennemies.

Miura Hanshi Mosaic, all tiles laid !

I finished laying Miura Hanshi's last tiles last night ! 

I worked fast on this piece as I want it ready as early as possible to take pictures, wrap up the rewards for my Kickstarter campaign backers and take with me to Pensylvania for the KNBK Gasshuku in November.

It took me just a little more than 2 weeks to lay this 22 x 30' piece. I hardly worked on any other mosaic while I was building this one.

Miura Hanshi Mosaic, October 3, 2015, DRY

Remember that you are seeing the back of the piece. it will be glued onto a ridgid support before it can be flipped and seen for the first time.

In the afternoon I sprayed the piece with water to show its actual colours.

Miura Hanshi Mosaic, October 3, 2015, WET

Water turned the granite tesserae from a dull grey to a brilliant black. You still cannot see the difference between the two different granites used for the background and for Hanshi's black attire. You'll have to wait until the piece is flipped - which should happen sometimes this week - and cleaned up, which should take care before October 15. 

 

Detail of the head

If you liked this post, please forward it to a friend. If you did not like it, feel free to forward it to your ennemies. 

 

 

I am a modern mosaic artist with a deep admiration for ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Arts. You can see my own mosaics on my site at mosaicblues. 

If you are interested by my work or would like to drop me a line please contact me by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639. 

 You can also

(and I recommend it !)

SUBSCRIBE to my

NEWSLETTER

Mosaic Project - TROY University

On Sunday October 10, from 2 to 5 p.m., I will lead the first FREE workshop  of our next Wiregrass Mosaics Project at the Troy University in Dothan. A second workshop will follow on Thursday October 15, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Our goal with this project  is to demonstrate the technical feasibility of community mosaic projects  by quilting together small individual mosaics.

In community mosaic projects, often, one big mosaic is realized by a team of individuals working together on a big mosaic.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A group snail mosaic

In our case, individuals will realize their own mosaic, which will later be quilted together to realize a much bigger piece. 

An individual snail mosaic

Once we have demonstrated our technical and organizational ability, we will be in a position to launch bigger projects involving much more people in the Wiregrass Area.

In this first stage, our goal is to cover with mosaics concrete furniture installed behind the Malone Hall. 

They include :

4 round tables & 12 round benches

1 rectangular table & 2 rectangular benches

Only the tops of the tables and benches will be covered with mosaics, the rest of the furniture will be painted.

On October 10 and 15, we will hold 5 workshops of 10 to 15 people each, to realize the individual mosaics. The participants will work from printed designs.

Later in October we will set the mosaics on the furniture.

I have organized similar projects over the past 2 years with the Wiregrass Museum of Art and the Headland Chamber of commerce.

• WMA Workshop, March 2015
• Headland Spring Festival Workshops, May 2015.

In May 2015 at the Headland Spring Festival, 20 small (6 x 6”) mosaics were realized by  children between the age of 7 and 12, some of them with the help of their parents.  We only used black and white ceramic tiles.
 

At Troy participants will mostly be adults: students of the University, and volunteers from the outside.  We will use the same type of ceramic tiles we used in Headland, only  in 10 different colours.

As I explained in an earlier post, I believe Art is the best way to develop creativity in people, because they can immediately see the result of their own creativity; and our world will need creators.

What is also very important is to help people realize what they can do as a group. Here, every individual makes a little mosaic, that little mosaic may not look very fancy by itself...

… But when you put side by side in an harmonious way all these little pieces, you get an amazing result.

 

This is why I like the concept of individual mosaics rather than having a group working on one big piece. In a group, the less assertive individuals might not be able to express themselves.


These workshops are open to students and teachers of Troy University AND  to the general public.

We would love to have you come join us, participate, and learn how to do these mosaics.

I will need much more participants for our 2016 projects, and am hoping to train people needed to lead small mosaic teams.

You need however, to REGISTER to participate so we can properly plan the workshops.



 
To Register and/or for more information, please contact :

• Donna Miller by email at dmiller@troy.edu or by phone at (334) 983 6556 ext 1321, or

• Frederic Lecut (me) by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639

 See you in October !

Charlotte & Carlotta

On this August 2nd, 2015, Charlotte finally met Carlotta ! 

Charlotte - Cellist, London, UK

Carlotta - 24 x 24", 61 x 61 cm, glass, ceramic & stone

The encounter was a surprise, Charlotte was not aware I was making her portrait !

Do you see a happy young woman, or what ? 

My Mosaic Portraits make great and unforgettable presents...

If you think you might be interested by one of you or of a loved one, please contact me by phone at (334) 798 1639, of by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com.

I am a modern mosaic artist with a deep admiration for ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Arts. I share my passion in my newsletter, as well as the work of other more modern mosaicists working with traditional or non-traditional media.

You can see my own mosaics on my mosaicblues website. If you are interested by my work or would like to chat about mosaics, please contact me by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639. 

You can also

SUBSCRIBE to my

NEWSLETTER

and become an insider to my passion, mosaic history, techniques and philosophy.

Spring Festival Mosaic.

It all started with an email "Frederic, we have this Spring festival on the Headland square in 10 days, do you think you could do a mosaic class for some kids ?"

I was not really thrilled at such a short notice, but when I realized this could be a great opportunity to  further test some ideas I had had in the back on my mind for a while, It became much more interesting !

Could I take 20 kids, teach them how to make a mosaic and get a decent result out of it ? 

In March, I had already experimented at the Wiregrass Museum of Art, with precut glass tesserae.

Each student had taken home their own mosaic. Now was the time to get people to cut their own tesserae. and to use each individual piece as part of a bigger work.

To make things easier, we would  use : 

• Ceramic tiles much easier to cut than stone, glass or porcelain;  
• 2 only colours : Black and White; and 
• 2 only basic designs for everyone to follow. 

I know, these are white and blue...

 

I could not get blue tiles !

On May 19, we set shop on the Headland Square. We had 2 groups of kids, those of ages 7 to 13 accompanied by their parents, and those over 14 by themselves .

At the end of the (long) day, we had 21 small squares mounted on fiberglass mesh. 

I took all of them home to my mosaicblues back yard to put them together on a framed backing board. 

The Panel before grouting.

On June 19, we had the grand presentation of the Panel at the Headland Municipal building. Some of the kids who participated in the project were present.

Everyone - that includes the kids themselves - was very impressed by what they had been able to do.

One important thing about mosaic, is that you can touch them, this is very important to children who have a very tactile reference to the world. 

I had brought the extra mosaic I had not been able to use for the panel (I only needed 20 and I had 21 pieces) and let the children handle it.

This project was made possible because lots of people pulled together. Rhonda Harrison, Executive director of the Headland Chamber of Commerce, Home Depot who gracefully subsidized most of the material and equipment, and the Headland Police Department who financed the rest of the project.

The mosaic is visible in the main hall of the Headland Municipal building on the Headland square.

What's next ? 

Bigger projects - first one will be in partnership with Troy University and should involve 80 to 100 participants, I will keep you posted.  Nexts are being presently discussed. I have big dreams ... And I'll need help ! 

I am a modern mosaic artist with a deep admiration for ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Arts. You can see my own mosaics on my site at mosaicblues. 

If you are interested by my work or would like to drop me a line please contact me by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639. 

 
You can also 

(and I recommend it !)

SUBSCRIBE to my

NEWSLETTER

Carlotta - Part deux

3 weeks ago I posted in Digital Drawing of a Mosaic Portrait about the first stages of the design of an actual mosaic portrait.

From an original picture I designed a coloured and a black and white drawing of my mosaic.

Carlotta - Polarized.

From that picture came a black and white one later to be used to print the actual model.

So far, most of the work had been realized through computer.

As I intend to build this piece in a classical roman style, I added around our young friend a double meander frame.

Carlotta ready to print.

I still had to define the colours for the unglazed ceramic tiles on the colour picture itself.

And on a Chart going with it. These are unglazed ceramic tiles.

And finally also had to define the colours of the glass tiles for the double meanders, which I did based on colours used on various actual Roman mosaics.

Lod (Israel)  - Detail of a panel border.

After all these definition work it was time to decide which actual tiles I would employ. This is going to be my first portrait made of unglazed ceramic only, and I have had to find tesserae of  21 different colours. Having accumulated ceramic tesserae from several trips to Europe, I found in the workshop all that I needed. 

On March 15, I lined up the containers of tesserae around Carlotta's model, on the working table where I will build her ! 

This is the actual support onto which I will build the mosaic itself. I will use the reverse method and you can see it is the mirror image of the original picture...

In a next post I will show you the actual building of this reverse method mosaic. Make sure you receive it in your mailbox : please subscribe to my Mosaicblues Newsletter where I also share with you news about Materials, Techniques and Sources of Inspiration of modern and antique (Specially Greeks and Romans) Mosaic Artists and Patrons !

I am a French Mosaic Artist. I usually live and work with my 2 dogs, 2 cats and 10 chickens in Headland, Alabama, USA but I have a second studio in Saint Valery sur Somme, France. You can see more of my mosaics on my mosaicblues page.

If you would like to discuss or commission a portrait mosaic, or any other type of mosaic, please call me at (334) 798 1639 or drop me an email at  frederic.lecut@gmail.com.

The Luana Mosaic

Some things are meant to happen...

The Luana Mosaic was one of them 

It was the convergence of several streams.

• My love of "Primavera" a famous painting by Renaissance Master Alessandro Botticelli.

• A hard to shoot picture of a talented young musician. 

 

• The sponsorship of her Grandparents,  Art collectors who shared my admiration for Boticelli's painting. 

We decided to create a portrait of her inspired by Botticelli's Primavera. From the original painting and picture, I designed a first model. 

I laid the printed model on the bench of my Alabama shop in early September 2014 and started to work. 

Luana Mosaic, Sep 17, 2014.

You can see on this view that Luana was built on fiberglass Mesh. I had built Miriam's Eyes last june following the same technique. This allows transportation of the light part of the mosaic, without all the heavy materials used to complete it.

This way, I would be able fly to France with Luana and 2 other mosaics in my suitcase and finish them in my new French Studio.

Luana Mosaic, September 27.

25 and 35 different kinds of materials were used on this piece.

On October 8, all tesserae had been laid. 

Luana mosaic, October 8, 2014.

I lifted Luana from her model, and had my first look at what she would actually look at the end of her journey to France.

 

 

On October 30, with my Daughter Mathilde - herself a mosaic artist. Luana is ready to ship !

On december 17, I set up my new studio in Saint Valery sur Somme and applied thinset and support on top of Luana !

On December 21, I removed the Fiberglass mesh.

And on Christmas Eve, Luana, framed and shiny was ready...

to meet Santa Claus, and the actual Luana ! 

No heavy stones were mistreated or abused in the making of Luana. As I only used thin ceramic, glasses, smalti and mirrors and mounted her on a lighter type of panel than the US ones, Luana is lighter than the mosaics I made before her.

The Luana Mosaic : 

• Glass, Smalti, Mirror, Ceramic.
• Wooden Frame.
• Dimensions : 21 x 25 " (53 x 63 cm).
• Weight : 21 lb (9.5 kg).

Portraits make outstanding presents and mosaics last forever ! If you would like to discuss or commission a portrait, or any other type of mosaic, please call me at (334) 798 1639 or drop me an email at  frederic.lecut@gmail.com

You can also Subscribe to my Newsletter to get the last news about Materials, Techniques and Sources of Inspiration of modern and antique Mosaic Artists and Patrons !