Hastings elementary school marked the end of the school year with a massive environmental art project Wednesday. More than 700 students, staff and parents gathered outside wearing coloured T-shirts to morph into the image of an alevin--a newly hatched salmon--to create a "living painting."

American artist Daniel Dancer created and directed the project known as Art in the Sky.

Fraser Riverkeeper, an organization aimed at protecting, conserving, and improving water quality and fish habitat of the Fraser River and its watershed, landed a $5,000 grant from RBC's Blue Water Project to cover the cost.

Volunteer Diana Bennett, who has two sons at the school, located at 2625 Franklin St., helped organize the event. "It's really about getting kids to see the big picture and to see when working together and collaborating they can create something really beautiful," she said, adding it was also meant to be an environmental initiative--students raised salmon and released them in April. "So the image they created of a [juvenile] salmon was the completion of the whole project."

The goal was to make every aspect as earth-friendly as possible, including avoiding plastic-wrapped snacks at the end of the day and using recyclable material.

The yellow, red and green T-Shirts worn by participants were made from organic cotton with soy-based dyes. Bark mulch and grass clippings used to create the outline for the image were put on the school garden afterwards.

The artist arrived at Hastings a day before the event to mark out the image, which was then traced with bark mulch.

"The next morning, [helpers] added the grass detail and the colour and the eye, which was some donated material from Value Village," explained Bennett.

Dancer, the artist behind the project's design, also talked to students about the concept before it went ahead. "Then the children filled [the image] in. They became all the paint drops. The red and yellow made the yolk sac on the alevin and the green and yellow also blended together to make the body and tail of the alevin," Bennett said.

On Thursday, Dancer played a video about the day at a school assembly. The elementary school has never organized such a large event with the entire school population, according to Bennett.

Lauren Hornor, a director on the Fraser Riverkeeper's board, noted there are 200 waterkeeper organizations around the world. One in Florida staged a similar project a few years ago and suggested other branches of the organization consider doing so too. Hornor started writing grant proposals in early 2008. "I thought it was an amazing opportunity to work with kids and do something a bit different to really impact the community," she said. "It was a special opportunity. The project demonstrated the power of collaboration and to be part of something bigger than just themselves. They hopefully were inspired to become stewards of their water and to become guardians of their watershed."

She noted the number 350 was traced beside the alevin. "That's the amount of parts per million that a consensus of scientists say will sustain us on this planet without the planet overheating," she said. "Right now we're at 390 and climbing so we're trying to promote the idea of getting back to 350."

noconnor@vancourier.com

Twitter: @Naoibh