Students, parents, faculty and friends are invited to view a series of stained glass windows that are currently on display in the breezeway connecting the Waldorf School’s lower school and the high school buildings.
The exhibit was put together by art teacher Ms. Nancy Metz and features stained glass mosaic images constructed by members of the junior and senior classes. Said Ms. Metz, "These projects give the students an opportunity to explore the creative potential and beauty of stained glass, where color and light work together."
Students interpret a painting in another media (usually pastel) considering design, gesture and color. In the process, they learn to appreciate stained glass for its individual characteristics and learn to work with it in a safe and focused manner.
"With each stage, moving from observation to pastel to stained glass window," said Ms. Metz, "the students turn further away from the source and closer to the essence of the relationship they have with the original painting."
Visitors are encouraged to look at the pieces from inside the breezeway during the daytime as well as from outside the breezeway at night when the building is lit. “I can’t think of any other material that has that same quality,” remarked Ms. Metz.
"I am grateful to Jerry Fotinatos at the Stained Glass Workshop in Farmingdale," said Ms. Metz. "Having access to such beautiful glass to use for the students is wonderful and adds so much to the quality of their work. I also thank George Lindsay, my husband, for making the ingenious clamps used in this exhibit and Mrs. Libia Gallo for her assistance in the hanging of the show. Their support makes it possible to take advantage of such wonderful space for stained glass!"
The stained glass mosaic is an art project incorporated as part of the 11th grade curriculum at the Waldorf School of Garden City. The experience encourages students to explore the gesture and color relationships in a painting by translating those observations to the medium of stained glass. The material of stained glass offers the student-artist the opportunity to see color in partnership with light. After completing these stained glass art projects, some students choose to continue to work in this medium as their senior art project, designing and constructing a single piece or a series of smaller pieces. The mosaics seen here represent projects from the junior year.
Stay tuned! There will be another stained glass exhibit by Waldorf students at the Tilles Center for the Performing Arts in Brookville, Long Island this spring!
