In 2006, I took a fine art mosaic class at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts with Jonathan Mandell. I learned how to use a tile saw, and discovered representational mosaic is not where my passion is! Of course I chose to render a scene with 4 sets of hands and feet. I admire Mandell’s ability to make lively figures and scenes, and one of the coolest is at Citizen’s Bank Park in Philadelphia, home of the Phillies.
I am not very familiar with baseball, having grown up in Canada, where it is not the national past time. Edmonton acquired a minor league team, The Trappers, in 1981, when I was 14. By then I was already embittered by my complete lack of ability in softball during gym class, and couldn’t understand why anyone would actually watch the sport. But now that I live in the Philadelphia Suburbs, I saw my first Phillies game, and to my surprise, enjoyed it! My husband introduced me to pleasures of snacking throughout on Cracker Jack, pretzel’s, and in his case, beer. I saw a new side of him when he would reflexively stand up and shout on the occasion of good plays by the Phillies. I was fascinated by the zenlike pace of play, and how I felt content to just be there. And there’s a lot to like about an organization that commissioned local artists to create pieces of baseball related art for the new park.
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This is a fantastic mosaic. I’ve never see this before and I’m not familiar with Jonathan Mandell. Thanks for the introduction.