UNIQUE initiatives
“I love giving back to the community. I am passionate about strengthening the links with my neighbourhood and adding a little extra at local schools allows me to work with enthusiastic students on new and exciting ideas.”
-Lisa Di Battista, RGD
Interactive Art Playground
Upcycled Tire Garden
Inspired by the title “Making Waves”, volunteer junior students from St. Gregory transformed old, used tires into beautiful garden planters for the school’s main walkway. With Lisa Di Battista’s guidance, students created an amazing focal piece from items destined for a landfill.
Obliteration Room at St. Gregory’s
Graffiti
Interactive Playground
ARTucate
Collaborate Art
Featured at sold-out shows at the AGO, Yayoi Kusama’s the Obliteration Room provided the inspiration for this interactive and compelling colourful display. Lisa organized a mini-version of The Obliteration Room, encouraging attendees to add their artistic input. They stepped inside ‘the room’ to embrace their creative spirit and come together as a community to add colour and vibrancy to the blank canvas. It was met with much enthusiasm.
As a kick off to St. Gregory’s annual ARTucate show, this massive mural was created by over 720 students from JK through to grade 8 in just one morning. Lisa Di Battista provided students with inspiration and examples by the well-known graffiti artist James Goldcrown, whose heart murals are some of the most photographed murals in the world. Students added their own hearts to the canvas using only markers and created this colourful and inspirational art piece.
As a way to bring some creative exploration and and artistic play, both casual and musical, Lisa designed and executed some installation pieces for a FDK outdoor yard.
The pieces were installed on the fence as way to connect students in different groups through music and exploration.
A number of loose parts were also included as creative open ended play.
Lisa has made valuable contributions as a committee member of St. Gregory Catholic School’s annual art exhibition and auction, entitled ARTucate. Along with teachers and staff, she is committed to ensuring the show’s success each year.
Lisa created and led a series of lunchtime abstract art workshops for primary, junior and intermediate students. The main focuses were colour schemes, analogous colours, and OP Art — a style of visual art that encompasses optical illusions. Using concentric, wooden circles or rectangles, students created illusions of depth in order to form colourful and collaborative pieces.
Main Learning points
– Abstract Art
– Colour schemes, analogous colours
– OP Art, short for optical art, is a style of visual art that uses optical illusions.
– Objects are analyzed, broken up and reassembled in an abstracted collaborative piece
Project scope
– Use concentric square or rectangles to create illusion of depth
– Create an abstract art piece
– Use line to create shape (both Elements of Design)
– Apply with cool colours, acrylic paint using brushes and non conventional tools – All pieces would combine to create one group 3D piece of art
Students were inspired to create while supporting their peers in mini studio setting. They experimented with colour, colour mixing, line, and value to create form