In November 2008,  I did artist-at-work demos and taught several mosaic workshops. (see previous posts).

It was a fantastic! Over the course of five days, several hundred people came through the Education Court to learn about mosaics, watch me work, ask questions, and even try their hand at setting some tiles and the Hammer and Hardie.

I did a series of one-day workshops and rounded out the second week with nearly 60 different students enthusiastically taking on “Ancient Stones in Modern Contexts”.

THE COURSE covered mosaics in historical context, a tour of the new Jim Dine exhibition, along with spectacular Roman mosaics from the Villa’s permanent collection. After the tour, students were asked to settle quietly into their “mind’s eye” and make notes about their impressions and sensations. I introduced the concepts of number sequences, magic squares, symmetry and order, changing color ways, and how to draw and count out a linear sequence. As a testament to the infinity of geometric possibility, a variety of designs were created from the simple grid once there was understanding of the underlying structure.