Today we took advantage of the lovely weather to work outside on some mosaics. I introduced the idea by showing off some of Chicago-based artist Edgar Miller’s mosaic work. We passed around the dry thinset mortar, and they started positioning the tesserae (tumbled glass and colored tiles) on some 6″x6″ squares. After I had mixed the thinset and they had arranged their mosaics, we began to “butter the bread” and set the tiles into place.
They came up with multiple alternative names for the thinset: “Pass the ice cream!” “Pass the goop!” The designs were all lovely and imaginative, and by the end they had mostly gotten a handle on the whole process.
I’m going to look at the grouting process next, and try to fit that into a future lesson so they can take home their finished pieces.