Day One - The Official Opening..

 Let the games begin…..

Everyone starts to arrive outside the town hall. I meet many of my mosaic friends from around the world – I can’t believe that so many of them have come here. 

Isidora explains about the overall design and it is decided that our listed number on the official poster should also become the number of where we should mosaic on the wall.

Because we arrived early and before this decision was made we have inadvertently mixed up a little of the placements and upset a couple of the artists.  Others want to trade places to be near friends and work colleagues   so slowly everyone settles to their places and get busy with their designs.

Before we could get too involved in our work the Mayor turned up. The municipal had set up large canopy’s outside the town hall and it was here that they announced each International artists. The Mayor presented us with a bag containing nippers, gloves, grout spreader, apron, cap and an intinery   for the next two weeks.  I presented him with a lovely Winston Churchill tie.  Many photographers and camera’s were present to document the ‘official’ opening on this project.  The Mayor was a rather dashing ‘Boris Johnston’ type – he had a ‘day time’ TV presenter feel to him and quickly won over the International artists talking and joking with each one.

After the excitement of the grand opening we had a quick snack and it was back to work.

It was explained that all the tiles were stored in a lock up just around the corner and we must go collect them in a bucket and bring them to our space. This was the moment of truth – the time we would first see what a wonderful pallet of ceramic colour awaited us.

I was quite shocked really, as there was not the range I had expected. There were quite a few, and these were gorgeous but not the variety I had expected. For example there was only 3 greens to pick from.  I realized how well designed the work is of the Chilean team as they use these colours so well – contrasting them so well.  Also many of the tiles were lower fired (more porous) than I had expected. I think they would be sold as interior wall tiles in the UK.  I am not sure these same tiles would be useable out door in the UK without the risk of the glaze falling off in frost. 

Anyway after waiting for out turn in the tile container we filled out buckets with tiles and returned to start on our section. I laid out all the printed tiles that I had brought along to use.

The technique was to basically cut each tile to fit a small section drawn on the wall in black, butter the back of the tile  with some ready made adhesive and pushed it onto the wall.

The first tile I fixed had ‘Have Hope’ printed on it – the second ‘Ten Esperanza’ -  a cultural exchange of words  right from the start.