Mosaic highlights heart of Pittsburgh
Levi MtJoy
Issue date: 5/31/09 Section: News
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Daviea Davis, a local glass artist, worked with Pittsburgh Glass Center (PGC), local schools and the community in a first-time collaborative residency and exhibition project that produced dramatic glass mosaic panoramas of Pittsburgh in the exhibit "Neighborhood Mosaic Project."
"The goal is to invite the community into an idea of Pittsburgh over a day and through a year," Davis, who has been working with stained glass for 15 years, told the Voice.
A salvage artist at heart, Davis, with the help from over 100 students and community members, used millions of donated pieces of stained glass to recreate the Hodge Gallery at PGC into an unusually unique perspective of the city. All materials used were recycled.
"After experiencing this installation, it will make looking outside and seeing Pittsburgh a totally new and different experience," Davis said. "You will never see the city the same way again."
Davis had been gathering ideas months before she and her assistant, Rick Forman, began the project of creating the kaleidoscope mosaic in January 2009.
Once the exhibition was completed, more than 20 depictive windows illustrated scenes from local neighborhoods around the city. Visitors enter the gallery through a replica of the Ft. Pitt Tunnel and, once inside, are immersed in pallets of colored glass fused together to create a collage.
Salvaged materials from around the city were used to create the installation. Construction Junction and Youghiogheny Glass gave donations and items were donated and collected throughout Pittsburgh neighborhoods.
"Spin around and you won't know what neighborhood you are viewing, but you'll see something familiar," Davis said. "It might be the steps in the South Side, flowers in bloom in your garden, the telephone poles along your street or the sun rising in the east."
A self-taught glass mosaic artist, Davis works primarily with salvaged stained glass. In addition to creating community mosaics at Pittsburgh Glass Center, she works with various Pittsburgh schools, inspiring children to be creative with glass. Her work is featured around Pittsburgh publicly and in private residences.
Davis told the Voice she enjoys turning "trash" into something beautiful-a lasting treasure. She is constantly thinking of new ideas and collecting materials that she can use for later projects.
"I will look around for what is at hand and then get lost in the looking," said Davis. "It's a treasure hunt. Sometimes, the smallest piece of orange will inspire a whole piece."
"Neighborhood Mosaic Project" is on display at Pittsburgh Glass Center at 5472 Penn Avenue until June 14, 2009.
Click here to view Pittsburgh Glass Company slideshow. Photos/courtesy PGC/permission granted to Voice.