By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
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ROCKFORD — The artwork students at Lewis Lemon Elementary School pieced together on Thursday isn’t destined for the front of their refrigerator at home. It’s going to be displayed across the front of the school for generations to come.
Roughly 250 students, mostly kindergarten through fourth graders at the west side school, 1993 Mulberry St., pieced together mosaic stained glass tiles that will be incorporated into a 120-foot long mural installed on the front of the school later this spring.
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The project is being led by mosaic artist and sculptor Susan Burton of Marseilles in partnership with the Rockford Area Arts Council. Students had the task of creating roughly 200 fish that will be depicted swimming through waters that connect the mural as it spans across the school.
“Mosaics can last up to 3,000 years, so they’ll be there longer than we will be on the planet,” Burton said. “And the kids will bring generations of kids to visit their artwork and their contribution to the mural.”
Burton has worked with students the past four years during the Rockford Area Arts Council’s SPARK! youth summer arts program. That program has led to the creation of projects such as the mosaic towers at the corner of Haskell and Fisher avenues in the Coronado-Haskell neighborhood, among others. You may also recognize her work from the mosaic tower and benches at Women’s Suffrage Plaza near 200 Y Blvd. in downtown.
This project includes nine 2-foot medallions that pay homage to Lewis Lemon, who was one of Rockford’s founders, as well as provide welcoming messages and display the pillars of education.
Principal Aleshia Jones said the project will help beautify the school and the west side, and she hopes it gives students a sense of belonging and ownership.
“I want them to have a sense of belonging at this school,” she said. “I want them to feel like this is their own school and they have a part in this history.”
The goal is to install the mural before the end of May.
“I think there’s something really powerful as a kid to participate in something during school and then come back to school in the fall and seeing that piece that you contributed to,” said Mary McNamara-Bernsten, executive director of the Rockford Area Arts Council.
The project was funded through part of a National Endowment for the Arts grant. McNamara-Bernsten said Lewis Lemon School was selected to coincide with areas where the city was focused on neighborhood improvement initiatives, and the goal was to create public art that reflects cultural heritage of the neighborhood.
Kids pieced their mosaic tiles together like a puzzle on a piece of sticky mesh. Burton will now take those back to her “art farm,” the name she gives to her art studio on her 10-acre mini farm, to arrange students work with her own to create the final project.
“It really is nice to have their representation on the art,” Burton said. “That’s what’s really special about what I do: Even if people put one piece of glass onto that mural they have a vested interest in it.”
This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on X at @KevinMHaas or Instagram @thekevinhaas and Threads @thekevinhaas