Wells Students Collaborate on Vibrant Mural

Over the course of about a month, Wells Middle School art teacher Angela Spreter’s Life Skills students worked on a bold, colorful mural that will soon find a home on the walls of the middle school. With students both at school and learning remotely, and social distancing guidelines to contend with, the project was a challenge.

“When we worked on the background, we had one or two students take turns painting,” Spreter said. “With the shapes, they used either a template or created them freehand. They used skills they had been using in art all year like tracing, cutting, painting with watercolor and tempera paints. They painted with sponges, brushes and added texture and definition.”

The mural, which depicts a vibrant garden complete with butterflies and a bird, has three-dimensional components that pop out from the canvas.

“It took a lot of hard work,” said Victor, who started working on the piece from home while he was learning remotely, painting watercolor leaves. “It took a lot of team effort. It took a long time for us to make it.”

Sean, who was remote throughout the course of the project, contributed by finding images of gardens and flowers to share with his classmates as inspiration.

Students all brought a little bit of themselves to the project, with some focusing on creating the fluffy white clouds in the background while others focused on adding their own special touches with the bird and the butterflies.

Victor was very proud of the end result — and of his classmates.

“It’s all of our ideas mixed together,” he said. “It’s a lot of beauty and it’s a lot of teamwork. It took a lot of love. My class did such a good job. I’m proud of all of them.”