By GINA TALAMO
Editor-in-Chief
Faculty members and students signed their names last Friday to become a part of The Signature Project, a mural comprised of 400,000 signatures.
Patrick Dunning, the creator of the mural, gave a multimedia assembly last Friday, sponsored by the Parent Student Faculty Association.
The Signature Project is a self-described “Adventure in Everything.” The painting is 76 feet wide by 36 feet tall, comprised of 171 canvas squares. Each square contains hundreds of different-colored signatures.
The performance itself featured visual arts, music, performing arts and technological demonstrations. In the process, Dunning told the stories of many of the people who have signed the mural, as well as those of his own family and Irish heritage.
“It’s like this big recipe with all these different flavorings in it,” Dunning said. “Not only is there a huge range of people and diversity, but there’s also a huge range of technical sci-
ences, and I tried to merge the two of those together.”
PSFA co-president Kathy Gilbert said she had seen Dunning’s presentation in her sons’ elementary school. Dunning has adapted the show for corporate events, as well as elementary and high
schools, she said.
“He said he’d always driven by the school, and always said it’d be the perfect venue because of the communications angle,” she said. “I thought the show was perfect for the type of school it is, and I thought the kids were really great with their response to the show.”
Freshman Julia Feigus of Brielle said she had seen Dunning’s performance in her middle school, but that it had been just as good the second time. Gilbert said there had been a “miscommunication” in who would be signing the portrait. Principal James Gleason said Dunning had wanted a small group of students to represent the school as a whole, rather than every person in the school signing the mural. “When he first came to the school, he was looking for a small group of students,” he said. Gleason said he met with SGA and class councils to determine that they would be signing the mural.
Dunning does not allow most of the students in a given school to sign the mural. He said that one main reason for this is time, adding that the time it would take for everyone to sign would not be beneficial for the students’ education. He also said that it was necessary to clear the area for lunch, and that he would be performing in Connecticut later in the day.
“There is also the legal question of signing your name to something,” he said. “Some parents are very suspect of hearing their son or daughter signed something in school that the parent did not give permission for.”
He said that permission slips can be “a nightmare” for school offices.
Dunning said he hopes that The Signature Project will one day be an evening performance in a controlled theater, where “everyone who sees it has the chance to sign.”
Senior Linette Reeman of Middletown said she thought the assembly was “incredible,” though she said she was angry to learn that she wouldn’t be signing the mural.
“I feel very strongly about [the project] and it was built up that we were going to get to sign it,” she said. “They didn’t tell us that until everyone was already standing up.”
Gilbert said she felt the performance went well until its very end.
“It could have been tied together a little bit more, and that’s where he could have been a little more clear on who was
going to come up,” she said. “Everything else was absolutely awesome.”