|
|
|
|
1417 Fife Street (1)
Location Map
|
Location: E side bet. Inkster & Mapleglen, West Face
Occupant: Elwick Village Resource Centre
District: North Inkster
Neighbourhood: The Maples
Artist(s): Ursula Neufeld (Ursula Neufeld Mosaics)
Year: 2013
Sponsors: United Way Winnipeg, Manitoba Arts Council, Neighbourhoods Alive! (Manitoba)
|
|
Ursula Neufeld: "We started with a community consultation. We wanted to know what
the community wanted on the front of the building that had all their programmes and
everything in it. We had a consultation with the kids, with the adults. As we started
pulling things together they would give us that information and we finalized it in the
first week or so. We had time out there- I met them all, I brought mosaic, I brought the
tools and showed them what it was like. They wrote things out."
"We had another session where we did a little mosaic cement block on Canada Day
which was another opportunity for dialogue. From all that, we garnered what they
wanted."
"They wanted a new sign. 'ELWICK' is done with tiles, but 'VILLAGE' represented
different parts of the world, so we used dishes, and different materials from different
parts of the world. 'RESOURCE' has things like keys in some of the letters, because of
their resources and that there are so many things that happen in this place. Everything
from Maintenance to computers. So there's one with computer components on
it."
"How we get these different substances to stick- it's got a lot to do with the mortar. We
add an additive- we don't put water in it; and it makes it really tough. We use tile, glass,
and all sorts of different things and they all seem to stand up. And with the grouting we
make sure that everything is properly sealed. It could be there for hundreds of years!
"
"Right inside the door there's childrens' mosaic. They drew their families and then they
mosaic'd their families on the mesh. They are actual drawings and actual renditions of
their families."
"We put a 'window' in the front and made it triple strength with 3 different layers to
make it durable. We used tempered glass; and the stuff we used to seal it with is heavy
duty. The whole back of it is done in tempered glass too. We put dishes on and we used
real teacups with 'steam' coming off them. I taught some of the kids in the
neighbourhood how to do the caulking."
"The nicest thing about mosaic is that there are so many different things to do with it and
so many things that one can learn using these materials. You invariably end up with
something very unique and very creative."
|
|