Delft Tile Workshop at the Cleveland Museum of Art

Hi all,

As a companion to the just opened exhibit Rembrandt in America at the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Museum's Teacher Resource Center is offering an exciting two-part Delft Tile workshop.  Educators and others participating in the workshop will study, design and create tiles in the Delft technique.  The tiles will be fired for later pick up.  I will have the pleasure of presenting the workshop and I'm enjoying being part of the new programs being presented by The Teacher Resource Center now under the direction of Dale Hilton, Director of Teacher and School and Distance Learning Programs at The Cleveland Museum of Art.  I hope to see you there for an exciting  two afternoons at the Cleveland Museum of Art.
Below is the Museum of Art's press release:

Delft Tile Workshop

Two Wednesdays, March 14 and 21, 2012
4:15 p.m.–7:00 p.m.
Celebrate the Rembrandt in America exhibition by decorating ceramic tiles in the Delft Holland style. As Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–1669) created moving masterpieces with his deeply affecting paintings and prints, artisans in cities such as Utrecht, Delft, and Gouda turned out thousands of humble yet charming cobalt blue and white ceramic works in the form of tiles. These utilitarian objects bore representations of animals, flowers, ships, and scenes of Dutch and Chinese life which give us insights as to the design vocabulary of the day. Learn about the tile maker’s techniques with ceramic artist George Woideck. The two-part series includes instruction and materials, and yields participants’ fired tiles of their own design.
Register by March 1 online or by calling 216-421-7350.
For questions on content please contact Dale Hilton at 216-707-2491. Workshop will be limited to 20 participants. Cost: $60.00. Register online.

My wife and I previewed the Rembrandt in American exhibit last week and found it thrilling.  As always, the Cleveland Museum of Art did a beautiful job displaying the over 30 genuine Rembrandts and the many more related works.  Included in the exhibit are interactive displays exploring Rembrandt scholarship and conservation.  In addition there is an outstanding exhibit of Rembrandt's prints and drawings.  Lots to experience--be sure to visit!
 
Best wishes,

George Woideck

 

George Woideck is a ceramic artist specializing in tile and mosaic.  View his work as artist-in-residence at tileandclayart.com .  See his recent projects on the Behance Network.  Call George at 216 225 0368.  Email him at gwoideck@tileandclayart.com.

 

The Spirit Of Gaudi Lives On: Contemporary Broken Tile Mosaics

Hi all,

A recent post, which covered the work of Antoni Gaudi and his contemporaries in Barcelona Spain in the turn of the last century, struck a chord with many readers of this blog.  Architectural ceramics, primarily mosaics was turned on its head thanks to this new and vibrant technique of surface decoration. The revolutionary art and architecture of that time and place, particularly the broken tile style of mosaics resonates today.  

I had long been a tile designer and maker when I visited New York City and happened on Grant's Tomb in Riverside Park in Manhattan one morning.  I was looking for a place to do my T'ai Chi and was stunned to see that the memorial was surrounded on three sides by an undulating poured concrete bench covered with dozens of scenes in broken tile mosaic.  I was familiar with the technique but had never seen such a large installation. The installation seemed to depict the history of New York City in a somewhat zany fashion.  It totaled at least several hundred yards.  Years later I found this article about the restoration of the project in the New York Times.  This major work of public art was largely the creation of Chilean artist Pedro Silva and was assembled in 1972 by a team of hundreds of volunteers.  In 2008 it was restored by the artist, his son and others.

Grant's Tomb, New York City

Riverside Drive and Sakura Park in the Background

Intrigued by the Gaudi inspired installation around Grant's Tomb in Riverside Park in New York City I began experimenting with the broken tile mosaic technique.  Shorty after that, I started receiving commissions for outdoor projects that were perfect for broken tile mosaics.  The first, titled "The Five Chinese Elements", was installed in the garden in front of Wilcox Elementary School in North Ridgeville Ohio.  It was designed and created by art teacher Sharon Aunchman's fifth grade students.  Each of five benches represented one of the the five traditional Chinese elements: Earth, Metal, Water, Wood and Fire.

Earth

Metal

Water

Wood

Fire

Completed Benches in Use

Future posts of Tile, Mosaic+Clay in Schools will look at more contemporary broken tile mosaics installations.  To receive notification of new posts to this blog click here and type subscribe in the subject line.  All email addresses remain confidential and are not shared with any person or site.

George Woideck

  





George Woideck is a ceramic artist specializing in tile and mosaic.  View his work as artist-in-residence at tileandclayart.com .  See his recent projects on the Behance Network.  Call George at 216 225 0368.  Email him at gwoideck@tileandclayart.com.

Math, Geometry and Islamic Art

Hi all,

I had a query recently about the source of an image of a tessellated  mosaic panel from the Alhambra that appeared in a recent post of this blog.  (Thirty-Sixth Post: Mosaics of the Islamic World) The query came from an architect and teacher from Buenos Aires and I had to pause to think where this image originally came from.

Tessellated Mosaic Panel in Moroccan Style

I pasted the URL of the photo into Google Image Search and while checking the results I discovered an extraordinary web resource of images of patterns in Islamic Art.  The website is aptly titled Pattern in Islamic Art.  It contains over four thousand images and includes many of the tessellated mosaic panels that are so dear to artists, architects and art teaches.  Looking at these images I recalled a recent visit to the the Metropolitan Museum of Art's New Galleries for the Art of the Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and Later South Asia.  A long title for some very beautiful galleries that opened, after extensive renovation, on November 1, 2011.  The renovations included work by Moroccan Craftsmen.  I had an opportunity to visit these galleries shortly after they opened and here is a small sample of photos that I took of the gorgeous art on

display there.

In the Moroccan Tessellated Mosaic Style

Earthenware Plate Influenced by Chinese Porcelain

 Patterns R Us, so to speak.  The tessellated mosaic patterns come from North Africa.  The beautiful ceramic tiles and pottery were often  made in the Turkish city of Iznik (the Byzantine city of Nicea, of the Nicene Creed fame).

I hope you take the time to explore the images on Pattern in Islamic Art and if the opportunity presents itself, visit the new Islamic Galleries at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

George Woideck


 

George Woideck is a ceramic artist specializing in tile and mosaic.  View his work as artist-in-residence at tileandclayart.com .  See his recent projects on the Behance Network.  Call George at 216 225 0368.  Email him at gwoideck@tileandclayart.com.

Three Exciting Professional Development Programs Combining Art, Math and Science

Hi all,

Several years ago I was invited to take part in an nationwide initiative to create professional development workshops that would have relevance for both teachers of the arts and teachers off other academic subjects.  The initiative was sponsored by the Kennedy Center of Washington DC and the training was rigorous.  In Ohio thirty-two teaching artists from all disciplines  were chosen to participate in a two year process.  Our goal was to fashion professional development workshops where the arts are co-equal partners with other subjects in the learning process--a far cry from when the arts sought justification in the curriculum through subordination to math, science, history, social studies, etc.

The first PD workshop I created through the Kennedy Center process was "Deepening the Understanding of Symmetry with Mosaics".  Perfect for me, a ceramic artist who uses math in his work.  This PD workshop highlights how the concept of symmetry is shared by visual art and geometry as well as science and nature.  Workshop participants first view a PowerPoint that covers the four types of Symmetry, the history of mosaics, and examples of symmetry from nature, art, math and science.  Teachers then plan and assemble a glass tile mosaic using symmetry as a design theme.  They also experience hands-on mosaic installation techniques. Teachers then reflect on their learning and review the possible use of other materials for the project.  Participants take home their finished mosaic project, a PowePoint and a teacher's guide with glossary, applicable math curriculum standards, bibliography and resource list.  I've presented this workshop a dozen times to teachers of all disciplines.  The following pictures were from workshops in Dayton, Wadsworth and Beavercreek Ohio.

The next PD workshop I created using the Kennedy Center model was "From Geometry to Escher: Teaching Tessellations in Math and Art". This professional development workshop explores the intersection of geometric tessellations with the work and design techniques of popular graphic artist M. C. Escher.  For math teachers it shows how to add a new, exciting application to the geometry their students are learning; for art teachers it explores the geometric basis upon which Escher created his perception challenging tessellations.  Teachers from the Wayne County Ohio area made the following tessellations.

My newest professional development workshop moves away from combining art and math and into that branch of physics called aerodynamics: the science of flight.   What better way to teach principles of motion and lift than to use the creation, decoration and flying of kites. Kites soar thanks to the same principles as aircraft fly and they offer wonderful surfaces for bold decoration.  All of this and more is contained in the workshop "Up, Up and Away! The Art, Science and Geometry of Making and Flying Kites".  Teachers working in the Akron Public Schools made the following Kites

One of the joys of presenting professional development workshops to teachers is knowing that they take the concepts and techniques learned back to the classrooms to reinvigorate their instruction.  I also enjoy the challenge of combining art with at least one other academic subject in a meaningful way to show the relationship between different parts of the curriculum.  Of course I also present professional development programs on purely art subjects like my popular "Sounds From The Earth" workshop in which we create three musical instruments from clay (this of course could be seen as combining the arts with at least one science, that of acoustics-- the physics of sound).

Call me at 216 225 0368 to discuss presenting a professional development workshop in your district .  Email me at gwoideck@tileandclayart.com.

George Woideck
 

 





George Woideck is a ceramic artist specializing in tile and mosaic.  View his work as artist-in-residence at tileandclayart.com .  See his recent public art projects on the Behance Network. 

Antoni Gaudi, Barcelona and the Modern Mosaic

Gaudi shakes up the world of architecture and mosaic

Spain not only brought us the mosaics of the Alhambra in the South of the country; it also gave us the the modern mosaics of Barcelona in the North.  They were created for buildings and parks  by Catalan architects Lluis Domenech I Montaner, Antoni Gaudi and Josep Maria Jujol in the late 19th and the early 20th centuries.  The most famous of these three is certainly Gaudi whose magnum opus, the church of La Sagrada Família is yet to be completed after more than one hundred years of construction.  The most significant quality of these architects' work is the seamless integration of architecture, sculpture, stained glass, ironwork and of course mosaics.  This created a joyous artistic style known in Catalan as Modernisme.  Their radical approach to mosaics was to mix traditional, square cut tesserae with irregularly shaped pieces selected from broken ceramic tile--a technique appropriately called broken tile mosaics.  These mosaics have a great deal more surface interest than traditional mosaics do.

Let's take a look at one of the early examples of this this style of architecture and mosaic creation, the Palau de la Musica Catalana by Montaner.  It's a concert hall designed for the Catalan Choral Society and it certainly would be a visual as well as an aural treat to attend a concert there.

Interior of the Palau with muses behind stage

Mosaic on the exterior facade-left side

Mosaic on the exterior facade-right side

Vent surround

Columns

The muses-upper sections

The muses-lower sections

The epitome of the Modernisme style in architecture is Gaudi's basilica La Sagrada Familia (Holy Family).  It has a surreal quality that is best described in photos rather than words.

 

 It's been in construction for a century now and on first viewing seems to be more of a fanciful sculpture that a house of worship.  The mosaic detail on the spires define the power as well as whimsy that broken tile mosaics can impart to architecture.

                                                                                      

Another of Gaudi's great works is the Park Guell, a horizontal creation as opposed to the verticality  of the the cathedral.

The Park Guell's famous lizard

Benches in the Park Guell

The Barcelona style of broken tile mosaic, usually identified with Antoni Gaudi remains popular to this day.  In our next post we'll profile some contemporary examples of this popular technique.
To receive notification of new posts of this blog click updates and type subscribe in the message line.  All email addresses are confidential and are not shared with any person or site.

George Woideck 


 

George Woideck is a ceramic artist specializing in tile and mosaic.  View his work as artist-in-residence at tileandclayart.com .  See his recent projects on the Behance Network.  Call George at 216 225 0368.  Email him at gwoideck@tileandclayart.com.