Concept
This collection of prints was the result of a study of the history of South Africa done by the schools in preparation for the visit by Lionel Davis, a former political prisoner in South Africa during Apartheid.

Lionel Davis is an educator and artist who lives and works on Robben Island in South Africa. He came to Windsor to tell the students about his own journey to freedom during the period of oppression in the early 1960’s and 1970’s at the Robben Island Maximum Security Prison.

We wanted to engage our students with Lionel’s story. Since he is a Printmaker, we decided to choose this medium and create a series of prints on the theme of Freedom and Justice. Visual Arts students in five high schools elected to engage in the project.

Process
The visual art teachers and artist in residence met and decided on the approach we would take. Rather that focusing on the South African experience, we would have the students reflect on their own lives. The prints would be about their experience of injustice, lack of freedom, or an issue they believe needed to be addressed. We hoped the work would communicate their vision and deal with issues in Canada that they wanted to address.

Students from grades 9 to 12 worked on the project. In each school, the teacher worked with students on technique and theme.

When the works were complete, we selected 40 prints to be included in the final public art piece for the CEC. The work was framed in 4 panels, as displayed on this page.

Click on any of the panels to see it displayed in a larger view.