( CNN ) -- For most people , Post-it Notes are disposable , ordinary office papers used for note-taking and reminders . But for 19-year-old David Alvarez of Leavenworth , Washington , they were the perfect medium for a 10-foot-tall mosaic depicting Ray Charles . David Alvarez , right , made this 10-foot-tall mosaic of Ray Charles using Post-it Notes . Using more than 2,000 of those ubiquitous brightly-colored sticky scraps , Alvarez composed a three-dimensional representation of the famous musician . The piece has just gone on display at Wenatchee Valley College in Wenatchee , Washington , where Alvarez is in his second year of studies . `` It 's something so simple . You can still see the flaps sticking out on some of them , '' he said . `` Naturally the Post-it Note just sort of flaps out . '' While learning new techniques in Adobe Photoshop in a class , he experimented with taking a photograph of Ray Charles and making it look like a mosaic on the computer screen . He then translated this idea into the Post-it work . He spent three months constructing the mosaic , sometimes sacrificing schoolwork for his art . At least one of his papers for his summer English courses suffered , but he persevered so that he could participate in an art show July 28 at the Stanley Civic Center in Wenatchee . Originally , the Post-it Notes stayed in this unique format only by virtue of their manufactured stickiness , which does not hold up as well as glue , Alvarez found . When he displayed his work at the show , he monitored the project for 14 hours , continuously replacing notes that were falling off . The aspiring art teacher now uses glue to hold the notes in place . For his next project , he is considering a mosaic using 4-inch x 4-inch notes , up from the 3-inch x 3-inch size used in the Ray Charles piece . `` Part of me wants to , part of me does n't , '' he said . `` It was so hard to align . It took a lot of time and patience . '' E-mail to a friend .
David Jones , mosaic with more than 2,000 Post - it Notes . Mosaic on display at Wenatchee Valley College , Washington . Artist wants to make art .