Gone to the wall

In July of last year I and countless other volunteers helped contribute to a giant work of art that took over a year to complete: a huge mosiac mural that when installed (about half a mile from where I live) would dominate an entire wall over 5m long x 3m high. It's called The Sherwood Tree of Knowledge and is the brainchild of local artist Anna Dixon. The piece was broken down into bite size chunks and each of us worked on small sections approximately 12" square. 

My 'bit' was the poppy you can see above. Until  I walked into Anna's garden studio 12 months ago on a beautiful sunny Saturday afternoon I'd never mosaiced(?) in my life, so I had to learn fast. With nothing more than a tile nibbler and hundreds (thousands!) of broken tiles & porcelain fragments at my disposal, off I went. Everyone in the room was dead friendly and very helpful.

A few hours later and after consuming countless cups of coffee and chocolate biscuits I had my poppy in the can (or whatever mosaicists say when they've broken the back of the thing they've been working on all day.) I loved doing it and loved being part of something very special. Sadly, I missed the grand unveiling a couple of weekends ago as I was out of town, but the picture below taken from the local rag gives you an idea of the buzz it's created.   

A big thank you to Mike Douglas & everyone at Sherwood Business Centre for helping to fund this fantastic installation.