Marvelous Meraviglioso Murals
Artists Working in Education (AWE), along with a donation from Milwaukee's Italian Community Center (ICC), helped the city’s new Italian Immersion school use art to build a bridge between the youngest students phasing into this groundbreaking new language and cultural program with older students in the Victory Gifted and Talented program.
The five-year-old kindergarteners, sixth and seventh graders at Victory K-8 School unveiled three Marvelous Meraviglioso mixed media murals on May 28, 2008. The works of art are a collaboration between the students and professional artist, Laura Easey-Jones and apprentice artist, Caitlin Carroll.
Under the artists’ guidance, the older students studied historic Italian landmarks and chose to create a series of works depicting the Coliseum, the Trevi Fountain in Rome and St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice.
Using a grid system method, students transferred images onto 5’X 5’ boards and learned about painting methods and materials as they painted. The K5 children made rubbings of textural classic décor patterns before creating their own two-dimensional egg and dart molding to frame the paintings.
Victory art teacher, Wendy Cooper, initially applied for an AWE School Studio project hoping that connecting students at both grade levels to Italian History and Art History would enhance the school’s sense of community by promoting collaboration and creativity while creating a lasting piece of artwork that is now permanently installed at the entrance of the school.
In celebration of the mural project, all K4, K5 and second grade children, and the K5 Italian Immersion children performed songs in Italian. Sixth grade students shared essays about the three historic Italian landmarks.
Guests included: Italian Community Center members including Thomas Balistreri and Anna Pitzo, AWE board members including past principal at Victory, Dr. Robert Wenner and executive director, Sally Salkowski Witte; director of curriculum and instruction in art at Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS), Kim Abler; Milwaukee Ald., Terry Witkowski; County Supervisor, Mark Borkowski, and many parents and friends of the Victory community came to celebrate.
A special thank you to Mr. Ralph DeVito, principal of Victory K-8 school, who retired in June, 2008, as well as Wendy Cooper, who provided the inspiration for this project, material for this article and most of the photos.
Major support for this project was also made possible from the Mary Nohl Fund of the Greater Milwaukee Foundation and the Richard and Ethel Herzfeld Foundation, with additional support for the Victory K-8 School program provided by WisItalia.
View the complete press release for more details about designing the murals and to learn about the Artists Working in Education (AWE) program.
Read what Milwaukee's Italian Community Center's "Italian Times" (pdf) had to say about this project. Former Victory K-8 School Principal, Ralph DeVito, proudly stands in front of the murals, which are mounted on the wall near the main entrance of the school. Victory School is located at 2222 W. Henry Avenue, Milwaukee.Come See the Mural Exhibit from Beginning to End
To see photos of the murals in the beginning, middle and end stages, view the online web album. Photos supplied by Wendy Cooper (Victory K-8 Art Teacher) and Amelia Reuss (Student Visitor).
Updated March 6, 2010
