October 2007 Unity and Diversity: exploring some issues A project of Presentation Secondary Schol, Warrenmount School, the Liberties, Dublin with Zambian artist Stary Mwaba An 80:20 Educating and Acting for a Better World Development Education Project

our Transition Year group, supported by Stary Mwaba and 80:20 set out to explore the theme ‘Unity and Diversity’ – as a result, we developed this mural.

laying down some of the groundwork

layering the ideas projecting photos of ourselves onto the wall, painting a ‘wash’ over these images, layering and painting

layering the ideas

Our quotes how they were chosen, where they came from, and why they were used - Martin Luther King, Rosa Parkes and Ola Joseph Ola Joseph – Nigerian Author

we explored stereotypes through looking at clothes and how people are ‘labelled’ by what they wear – a big issue for teenagers – judging people unfairly

The falling petals symbolising the ‘issues that can be solved’

we chose images of shoes to represent the idea of ‘standing together’ – old and new, men and women etc.

Our symbol for ‘opposite but equal’ – going in different directions but in the end, all the same

What we learned from the project Projecting images and then drawing and painting them How to ‘layer’ our ideas Group work Drawing on a large scale Questioning ideas and images We learned about unity and diversity Thinking differently, turning our thinking into physical images About Zambia Not doing the obvious Relating broader issues to ourselves Stary challenged us about racism – ‘he saw us for what we are and didn’t judge us’ Stary ‘taught us things without teaching us directly, or even saying anything’

Our group with mural …

… and with Stary from Zambia and Ciara from 80:20