History
Mosaics are works of art composed of small pieces of marble, glass, stone, ceramics, and/or any other kind of materials. Researches state that the art of mosaics began during the third millennium B.C. with the use of mud cones placed tip first into a background to give decoration, and has continued to evolve and grow into a very popular and esteemed art today.
The Greek and Roman Mosaics
Like most kinds of art, literature, and culture, the art of mosaics was born in the cradle of civilization, the Middle East. The Greeks, however, where the first to establish the pebble method to a form of art involving geometric patterns and scenes of people, animals, places, and nature. It wasn’t long before they desired more detail and thus introduced the “tesserae”, small cubic pieces of cut stone collected on a base to form precise mosaic murals. Moreover, the art of mosaics was taken a field, with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The Roman mosaics, however, where a close reflection of there culture. Most of the artifacts displayed scenes of the Roman Gods, domestic themes, and geometric designs. The roman mosaics, mostly made from marble and other kinds of stone were used to cover floors and baths. Soon, and after the rise of the Christianity, there was an obvious change in the Greek and Roman mosaic style. New images portrait Jesus, the virgin Marry, the apostles, the saints, and angles in different scenes.
The Byzantine Mosaics
With the rise of the Byzantine Empire on the land of Byzantium (now known as Istanbul, Turkey) in the 5th century, mosaics began to take on new characteristics. In that place and time, the art of mosaics was eastern influenced. The Byzantines used special glass tesserae called smalti. Manufactured in northern Italy, smalti was made from think sheets of colored glass. This mosaic art was specialized in covering walls and ceilings. Since the smalti was slightly diagonal they caught the light in different ways to reflected and sparkle in the building’s interior. Soon after that, a new theme would be added, Christianity.
The Islamic Mosaic
In the 8th century, the Islamic mosaic art and tiles were brought to the Iberian Peninsula by the Moors. However, elsewhere in the Muslim world, stone, glass and ceramic were all used in mosaics. The Islamic mosaic art was mainly composed of geometric and mathematical deigns, in contrast to the figurative murals done by the Byzantines, Greeks, and Romans. The Muslim Arab countries used a unique and beautiful style called the “Zillij”. This style used ceramic or other kinds of stones, especially made to fit together perfectly and cover the desired surface.
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