Nautical Ceramic Tile Mural

It's done! Brandon School's beautiful nautical-inspired mural is complete and not a moment too soon. Every year, the 6th grade class participates in a special art project creating a mural for the beautification of the school. This was our fourth mural and already the school's interior court is looking quite grand!

I plan to compose an entire lesson plan available through download in the near future. Many people have asked about my murals and my answers always take way too long to explain. There are so many factors that go into creating a student mural. The drawing stage, clay stage, glazing, firing and most important, mounting. This mural motivated me to document each step as everything that could go wrong, did. Seriously. I was ready to pull my hair out. So my mistakes will be your gain!

I'm so proud of the student's efforts though, so I just had to show-off their work!

On a personal note, my middle child, Tate, just graduated from Junior High last night and today is the first "official" day of summer. A sense of calmness has overcome our home. It's wonderful.

Butterfly Ceramic Tile Mural

After countless hours (well, not exactly countless...about 2o!) the sixth grade mural at Brandon School is completed. With only the grouting left to go, I snapped a few pictures on the last day of school. Every year we create a new mural. Different themes and different styles and all beautiful. The Butterfly mural is our third one.

To start, I hold a class specifically for explaining the purpose of the mural, the process of creating homemade tiles and then go on to talk about our theme. After this class, each student will have made a drawing the same scale as their final tile. In this case, a drawing of a butterfly.
The next class is the biggie. I prepare for the class by cutting two 6" x 6" tiles for each student (124 in all). The students lay their drawing over one clay tile and etch in their drawing. Using a cutting tool, they cut out their butterfly and affix it to the second tile. We talk about scoring, creating dimension by folding and lifting the wings, creating a background and finally ensuring that all added on pieces of clay are securely attached.This process takes about an hour and I help the kids who are struggling with the fine details of this project. If you can swing it, have parents help. I had four parents assisting with this project.


The last part of the class involves painting the tile with under-glaze. Traditional ceramic methods call for drying and firing the tile first, but my class time with the student's was limited to only two sessions, so I combined the making of the tile with the painting.
After the painting, the tiles were set in a cupboard to dry. This took about ten days. Once dry, the tiles were fired, then glazed and fired again.
The results are beautiful. I'm so pleased with how engaged the children were. This is their legacy to the school and all seemed to consider this carefully while working on their tiles.
Well done, sixth graders!

Keith Haring Inspired Ceramic Mural

It's finished! After 6 weeks of drawing, building and painting, the 6th grade mural at Brandon School is completed.
It looks beautiful...colorful, vibrant, energetic...adjectives I would use to describe the students who made it.

The process was easy, well, easy as far as making ceramic murals goes! Student were given background info on Keith Haring and were shown some of his more famous pieces. Then they drew a figure on a piece of paper (5" x 6").

One week later, we met to turn our drawings into a ceramic tile. I prepped 2 5 x 7 pieces of white Laguna clay (I use a multi-string clay cutter) for each student. They laid out their drawings on TOP of one piece of clay and then traced their figures with a small dowel (a dull pencil would do fine). Using a plastic clay cutter they cut away the excess clay from their figure. Using the slip 'n score method (we call it scratch attach) the students secured their clay figures to the other tile. Using the bits and pieces of left over clay, some students added details surrounding the figures, being extra careful to ensure that its adhered properly.

The tiles were laid out to dry for 10 days. We had a hot spell in California and some of the pieces dried too quickly. This caused some curling around the edges. I could have prevented this by placing a plastic sheet over the tiles to ensure a slower drying time. But...we were running out of time!

The last time I saw the kids, their tiles had been fired and were ready for under-glazing. The kids were shown a few techniques but quickly set off to work and complete heir beautiful tiles. The first kids finished helped dip ' glaze the pieces. I used a Duncan Dipping Glaze. Makes the whole glazing process incredibly fast and simple.

Earth Science Mural

Once again, the 6th grade mural at Mountain View School is fantastic. This year, Mrs. Young and Ms. Scharfeld chose "Earth Science." Then, the ceramic teacher, Ms. Valance and myself came up with a visual plan. We thought that creating an "organic" or non-linear mural would suit the theme.
We spent an entire class period discussing the mural, breaking down the theme into sections and finally, drawing the ideas on paper.
The next class was devoted to building the clay pieces. Ms. Vallance showed them how to create dimensional objects, building up and out rather than flat. After the pieces were dried and fired, the students' painted their pieces, glazed them and fired them the second time.
At this point, Ms. Vallance and I had hundreds of varying sized pieces. How would it come together? After discussions with the two men who would be installing the mural, we decided that created a template was our best option.
Frank and Mike did a great job of duplicating our template and only having to make a few adjustments with extra tiles, etc.
Congratulations 6th graders! A stunning mural!

Earth Science Ceramic Mural

We're in the layout phase of our ceramic mural at Mountain View School.
The theme this year was earth Science and, at first, I was a little unsure. I mean, how creative can you get with science? Shame on me for being so close-minded!
The students created sections entitled "Organization of the Environment", "Rainforest", "Oceans and Coral Reefs", "Plate Movement", and even "Food Chain".
The students built their pieces without worrying about how it would fit all together. I'm not sure I would do this organic method again, as it proved to be quite a challenge. But here we are, at the end of the process, and it all looks divine. I'll post photo's of the finished product soon.

Ancient Greece Mural

Check out the beginnings of the 6th Grade Class Tile Mural Project at Mountain View School. The kids use terra cotta clay for this project. The girls below are in the process of "building" their clay tiles.

The students first study Ancient Greece in their homeroom classes, brainstorming and eventually deciding on a single item to design into clay. I helped the kids isolate the image in order to draw it on a square piece of paper. Then, Ms. Vallance, the ceramics teacher, prepared the clay 5 x 5 tiles and gave each student a ball of clay in which to "build" up their tiles. Some kids worked on individual tiles, while others teamed up to make a larger collection of tiles.
A Helmet and a Cyclops are featured below. Notice how well the students worked their clay pieces to resemble their original drawings. I especially like the Cyclops teeth--each tooth is
a small piece of clay. The clay will lighten somewhat after the first firing.


Catherine Vallance and Xeni's mom add the "purple" glaze which will be fired to create a shiny, glass finish on the mural tiles. This step can be done by the kids but it helps to have some parents around to ensure that the bottoms of the tiles are free of glaze (so it doesn't stick to the kiln shelf).

California Fruit Inspired Ceramic Mural

The students at Brandon School created a wonderful legacy in the "produce-inspired" ceramic mural. First, the student's drew their chosen California produce onto a 5"x5" piece of paper, then turned the one-dimensional drawing into a 3-dimensional tile by pulling, attaching, molding and texturing. Most kids really got into this tactile art project and created beautiful, realistic avocados, husks of corn, bunches of grapes, sweet cherries, artichokes, Meyer lemons and naval oranges!

The tiles were laid out to dry for about two weeks then it was off to the kiln. After the first firing the students painted their tiles and dipped them in a purple glaze. The results were fantastic and the students were pleased.

The mural is mounted just outside Mrs. Meyer's office on the inside wall of the bowl. Great job kids!