Beige begone! Colourful murals enliven Whitehorse school

Students in Whitehorse have been transforming the walls of their high school by adding colourful murals.

It's the second year for the art project at F.H. Collins Secondary School.

Twenty-six Grade 11 and 12 students in the elective arts class have been given themes such as the environment, music or mathematics. From there it's been their job to get creative.

"We've been encouraged to cover the whole school, it's a multi-year project," said art teacher Hayley Thiesen.

Math mural

Grade 12 student Zeke Dukart was painting a numerical mural near where math classes are taught. 

"We have the golden ratio on some kind of colour gradient, and different mathematical constants," he explained. 

At the bottom is a saying he attributed to Albert Einstein: "Mathematics is the poetry of logical ideas." 

Dukart says the project "makes the walls a lot less bland. This allows students to put something here that will be here a while." 

Ocean life and a message about climate change

Yooie Mak, in Grade 10, has worked on a big mural showing whales, fish and other ocean life as well as a big stopwatch.

The message: Tick tock. Time is passing and earth's oceans are warming.

"The stopwatch symbolizes how much time we have left to stop the issue," she said. 

Mak said she's happy with the result, as this is her first painting of this size.

"I really love it. I think we've been trusting the process, we worked on it and I really like the outcome."

Other murals show favourite sports teams and even celebrity chef and television host Guy Fieri.

Ava Irving-Staley, in Grade 11, was working on something near the band room: a raven wearing a white-feathered trilby hat perched on a rainbow piano keyboard.

"It's a nice pop of colour," she said. 

Kyruss Hodginson, in Grade 11, painted a big, snarling, ready-to-brawl Marvel Comics character, Wolverine.  

"I think it shows that the school is open to art and it makes it more vibrant and more alive," he said.