Below you will see some of our completed projects.
‘Centering’
Premier Health Network | Culture Works | Miami Valley Foundation
Jes McMillan, Premier Health & Team Mosaic (Dayton, OH)
’Centering’ ~ 2022
Porcelain & Stained Glass - 144 sq ft (12’ x 12’)
Located at Premier Health, Miami Valley Region
This mosaic was designed by Jes McMillan to fit the theme ‘Centering’ for a network wide, Premier Health employee wellness initiative. The Wellness Program was organized by Culture Works Dayton and included several other alternative healing experiences including sound healing.
Team Mosaic prepped materials for 2 weeks leading up to the initiative so that everything was in place to easily engage a high volume of participants. The team finished the mosaics over a 2 week period following the initiative, adding up to a 6 week in total project execution timeline.
One design was broken down into 11 separate mosaic boards and sent to 11 different medical facilities across the Miami Valley Region. The pieces remained at these locations for 14 days, where we engaged over 10,000 participants to create the mosaics. In partnership with Culture Works we developed a ‘Healing Arts Ritual’ video to walk participants through breath work, coming to an awareness of pain and the releasing ritual of that pain into the mosaic. The goal of this entire Employee Wellness Project was to provide those who are dedicated to keeping Us All alive and healthy, avenues of healing from Covid Trauma.
‘The Seedling’
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Pre-School Promise | Dayton RTA
Jes McMillan & Team Mosaic (Dayton, OH)
’The Seedling’ a Paul Laurence Dunbar gameboard ~ 2022
Porcelain & Concrete - 3 x 15 ft
Located in McIntosh Park, West Dayton
This mosaic gameboard was designed by Brian Lawrence, a Dayton Native, who grew up in West attending the same church as Paul Laurence Dunbar. He brings to life a famous PLD poem ‘The Seedling’, featuring a young Paul & friend reading.
This PLD Mosaic gameboard was commissioned by Pre-School Promise and gifted to the Dayton Regional Transport Association, (RTA). The mosaic was lead by the Mosaic Institute and completed by Team Mosaic in the South Park neighborhood studio.
‘Together We Rise’
Learn to Earn Dayton | Pre-School Promise | Omega CDC | Leadership Dayton
Jes McMillan (Dayton, OH)
’Mosaic of Hope’ ~ 2021
Porcelain & Concrete - 260 sq ft
Located at the hope center, North Dayton
This game board was designed with the aid of Pre-School Promise, to engage infant to 3 years and beyond. The placement of the mosaic just outside of the Hope Center on Omega property is to encourage play and connection between older and younger members of the community as there is a pre-school and Senior Living facility also on the Omega Campus.
The Kenta Cloth Bird design was created by Boog the Illustrator, a Dayton Native. The video above was created as part of the Learn to Earn Dayton 2021 & Pre-School Promise Annual Summit. As a part of this virtual event, 600 tiles were included in kits and sent out to attendees. During the event messages of hope were written on the tiles and then later sent to us in the mosaic studio. We took those tiles to North Dayton and the community placed them in the HOPE mosaic gameboard, creating the first Virtually Collaborative Mosaic mural.
The Mosaic of Hope ‘Together We Rise” was commissioned by Learn to Earn Dayton & Pre-School Promise and gifted to the Omega Community Development Corporation with donations from Baker Concrete Construction and Ernst Enterprises, Inc. The mosaic was lead by the Mosaic Institute and completed by Leadership Dayton, 2021 L2E summit attendees, and volunteers from the North Dayton community.
Flight Games
Jes McMillan, Vincent Detrick & Team Mosaic (Dayton, OH)
’Flight Games’ ~ Hopscotch 2021 - Seek & Find 2022
Porcelain & Concrete - HOP 3’ x 15’ - S&F 5’ x 6’
Located in Wright Dunbar, Aviation Heritage National Park
‘Flight Games’ consists of a 17’ long Airplane Hopscotch and a scene of the Wright Brother’s including 31 hidden objects relevant to flight. This mosaic was made possible by a Montgomery County Cultural Arts, Special Projects grant administered by Culture Works.
1.Airplane Hopscotch
at the Fifth Cycle Shop (LOT) 1129 W. Third St.
Play alone or with others. Hopscotch is a popular playground game in which players toss a small object, called a lagger, onto the game board. IInstead of numbers, this hopscotch has airplanes! The object is to hop from plane to plane but you must be facing in the direction of the next plane when you land. It's a twist at the hip hopscotch! So have fun trying to pull off 360s in the air!
Use the lagger on the alphabet clouds to count letters and hops. Or why not mix it up by tossing a lagger directly onto the targets. Who can get a bullseye?!! With numerous elements in this piece, you can create your own hopscotch game.
2. Wright Brother's Seek & Find Mosaic –
At 16 S. Williams St. Located near the door of the National Park’s Visitor Center.
This mosaic gameboard has 31 objects relevant to FLIGHT hidden within it. Some are easy to find... some aren't. All of them have a story. Tour the Aviation Heritage Museum and then play this game to identify many objects of importance you learned about while visiting the National Park.
Hidden objects:
9 BIRDS
Wilbur Wright
Orville Wright
The Wright Bicycle Shop
Van Cleve Bicycle
Sprocket 1
Sprocket 2
Chain Link
Van Cleve Bicycle Badge
The Wright Flyer
Piston
Hawthorne Leaf
‘S’ for Scipio
Cow 1
Cow 2
Moon
Apollo 11
Wright Brother’s National Monument
Kitty Hawk Dunes
Propeller 1
Propeller 2
Print Block
National Park Service Arrowhead
‘9 Doves’
Oregon District Shooting Memorial
Jes McMillan & TEAM MOSAIC (Dayton, OH)
’9 Doves’ ~ Dayton shooting memorial, 2019
Porcelain & Concrete - 5’ x 6’
Located in City Hall
We designed, prepped and lead the creation of this memorial mosaic as a therapeutic first response to tragedy. It was started with the Dayton community during Dave Chappelle’s ‘Gem City Shine’ event August 25th. Hundreds of people, before placing the tiles, wrote prayers and messages to honor the 9 lives that were taken on August 4th, 2019 during the Oregon District mass shooting. After the event the mosaic was set up to be finished in a more private setting and we welcomed many of the victim’s friends and families to honor their loved ones. The messages written in this mural are raw and filled with emotion from trauma. They are steps towards expression, understanding and healing.
The tile for this piece was donated by Daltile. Our local Home Depot donated some materials and my team of Mosaic Artists donated the time to create the doves, the hands and the yellow beams of light. All were completed in just 11 days before the event. Special thanks to award winning poet Sierra Leone for blessing the materials before we started and providing a healing and sacred space during the event. Thank you to the Contemporary Dayton for entrusting us with this honor. And most of all, thank you Dayton.
Art in the City - Dayton Arcade
UNITY GEM mosaic
Jes McMillan (Dayton, OH)
UNITY GEM, 2019
Porcelain & Concrete - 12’ x 9’
Location at the entrance of the Dayton Arcade
Over a thousand Daytonians placed a piece of porcelain tile in this mosaic ‘Unity Gem’ on August 2nd, 2019 during Dayton’s ‘Art in the City’ event. This was the largest mosaic we have attempted during a single event and the largest number of people so far that took part in a collaborative mosaic project.
The ‘Unity Gem’ is set to be installed during the sidewalk reconstruction phase of the Arcade restoration in summer of 2024.
‘BEE Ambitious’
City of Kettering
Jes McMillan (Kettering, OH)
Bee Ambitious, 2019
Porcelain & Concrete - HOP 3’ x 29’ - 10x Bees at 3’x'3’ each
11 Locations in the Haverstick Neighborhood
Discover a neighborhood through sidewalk games with the public artwork Bee Ambitious!
Placed in 11 locations around the Haverstick neighborhood, Bee Ambitious includes a broken beehive represented in a 29-foot mosaic on Mendota Court, and 10 mosaic bees scattered along Tabor Avenue, Reardon Drive, Colton Drive, Gay Drive, Wilmington Pike, and Forrer Boulevard.
The bees hold clues to a word scramble, with two to three letters found in their wings, and several more letters in the game board. In total, there are nine games that can be played in the artwork!
Artist Bird Mural
Train overpass bridge at Keowee & First Street, Dayton
Article
https://www.dayton.com/lifestyles/here-why-birds-are-being-painted-along-downtown-dayton-bridge/hEPTihAYFWtD7EfafRnsVK/
Mosaic Walking Tour
City of Miamisburg
Impact Mural
Club Impact, Miamisburg's youth center.
Mound Elementary Mural
United Rehabilitation Services Mural
Bear Elementary Mural
Montgomery County STOP Mural
Montgomery County Monday Mural
American Legion Mural
City of Miamisburg
Bauer Elementary Mural
Kinder Elementary Mural
Mark Twain Elementary Mural
Lady Viking Mural
the Lady Viking, 2016
painted mural
Miamisburg, OH
The ‘Lady Viking’ was a mural donated to the city of Miamisburg, by The Mosaic Institute. The design was a collaboration between Jes McMillan, who developed the concept of a proud, art nouveau inspired female representation of Miamisburg’s mascot and mural painter Jennifer Sayger. McMillan used a model from stock photography for the female and crown (pictured above) and Sayger later added the “Mucha inspired“ elements of the hair and background. A team of Artists including: Lead Mural Artist - Jennifer Sayger; Ryan Whaley; Vincent Detrick, Zelestia Valasco and Jes McMillan volunteered to paint this mural.