Charlotte Elementary Students Paint a Mural of the Town’s Past
education, elementary, greensprings, mural, painting,
Now that’s a big canvas.
Fifth-grade students at Charlotte Elementary School painted a large mural in 2006 on an exterior wall of the GreenSprings Office Center on Spring Street in Charlotte. The mural‚ entitled “Charlotte Through the Years‚” features several images of Charlotte from days gone by up until today.
The mural was the idea of GreenSprings Office Center owner Vince Smolucha‚ who contacted the elementary school to see if students would be interested in the art project.
“Our school’s art teacher at the time‚ Gwen Daniel‚ and I applied for a Community Arts Development Grant to fund the endeavor‚” says Malissa Johnson‚ principal of Charlotte Elementary School. “The funding came through‚ so we talked to several local historians in Charlotte to make sure the mural would be accurate.”
Johnson says Charlotte art gallery owner H.R. Lovell was hired to oversee the project.
“The students actually painted the mural as they worked side by side with H.R. and our Miss Gwen‚” Johnson says. “For example‚ one student might have painted a butterfly‚ and another might have painted the bricks featured on one of the historic homes in the mural. All fifth graders at Charlotte Elementary had a hand in the project‚ from the priming to the painting to the cleanup.”
Johnson says students learned about color and painting techniques from Lovell‚ then got to work.
“H.R. would take a group of students to paint for a couple of hours‚ then another group of students would relieve them‚” she says. “The Home Depot and Behr Paints donated a lot of the materials‚ and Charlotte now has a beautiful mural of its history that everyone can be proud of.”
Story by Kevin Litwin
