Wednesday, December 12, 2012

The Buggy Garden Mosaic - Grouting, Day 1

This is the continuing story of the mosaic mural I created for Hug A Bug Preschool in El Cerrito, California. A workshop was held on November 17th for 15 parents to each make a small mosaic insect to be incorporated into this larger mosaic work to be permanently installed on their site. 
 The install went smoothly on December 10th and the next day I arrived to begin grouting. The weather reports called for a small rainstorm to hit in the early evening so I had a feeling the grouting wouldn't be finished in one day. And I was right! 
 Grouting a mural with the type of "terrain" of this one is a difficult process. Some of the figurines stand out an inch from the base while other tessarae are very flat...some are glossy in texture while others are porous...and some tessarae are very meaningful to the individual who created the "bug". And the grout itself has to have a texture (not too thick yet not too runny) that can easily fill in all sizes and shapes of grout joints! So I knew that grouting this was going to be a slow and painstaking process. And I was right!! 
 But there is such a wonder when "the reveal" begins - the wiping away of the grout and slowly buffing each piece into a high shine!
 As expected, though, the weather took a turn for the worse - dark, damp, cold and blustery....so I stopped and will go back and finish tomorrow.
 

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