Pomegranate

Work in Process : The Pomegranate Tree, April 26, 2015

I love pomegranates so much I planted five of them trees in my garden ! Not only are they delicious, Pomegranates are also is laden with mythological symbolism.

The Greek Goddess Persephone (Roman Proserpine)  got in trouble because she ate some why in Hades where the evil Pluto had taken her !

Proserpine by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

The Pomegranate mosaic is 22 x 24" (55 x 60 cm), made entirely of glass, it is inspired by a 13th century Persian Manuscript. 

Original Persian Manuscript

  

Pomegranate should be available in June 2015. 

Detail of Pomegranate - April 26, 2015

I am a modern mosaic artist with a deep admiration for ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Arts. I share my passion in my newsletter, as well as the work of other more modern mosaicists working with traditional or non-traditional media.

You can see my own mosaics on my site at mosaicblues  If you are interested by my work or would like to drop me a line please contact me by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639. 

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The Pasiphae Mosaic in Zeugma (Turkey)

This extraordinary mosaic covers close to 800 Square feet of the floor of a huge meeting hall of a Roman Villa from Zeugma (Turkey).

It represents the myth of Queen Pasiphaé (sitting on her throne).

The Greek version of the myth goes like that (please keep in mind that the Greeks did not really like the Minoans, and were a very patriarchical culture) : Pasiphae - Sister of the beautiful and wicked Enchanteress Circe (who once had changed Odysseus comrades into hogs) - had been given as spouse to King of Crete Minos.  

For some obscure reason - either her or Minos had pissed him off - Poseidon curse the Queen to fall in lust with a White Bull belonging to the King.

The Queen hired the King's Engineer in Chief Daedalus to assist in her endeavour to be coupled to the Bull. With the help of his son and apprentice Icarus, Daedalos built a hollow wooden cow, wrapped in a bovine skin and endowed with mechanical life. Hiding inside this contraption the Queen was able to copulate with the Bull. From their unusual union she conceived and bore the hybrid bull-headed child Asterion, also called Minotauros by the Greeks.

 

Pasiphae & the Minotaur, Apulian red-figure kylix
4th B.C., Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris

In the emblema of the mosaic pavement Pasiphae (ΦACIΦAH), an unidentified maiden and her Nanny - Trophos (TPOΦOC) watch as Daedalus (ΔΕɅɅΟC) and his son Icarus (ΕIKAPOC) with his woodworking tools are building the wooden cow. 

The same myth was represented in a fresco from the Casa dei Vettii in Pompeii. It is very interesting to note that the 5 same persons are represented, and above all, that the Queen is posing in almost the same posture and outfit in the fresco and mosaic.

300 years separate the 2 pieces... The fresco was likely realized during the 1st century AD (Pompeii was destroyed in 79 AD), and most of the Zeugma mosaics were laid during the 2nd century BC. 

Were there patterns or workbooks of mythical representations that master craftmen were passing to each other ?


The Zeugma Mosaics  can be seen at the Gaziantep Archaeology Museum in Turkey.

I am a modern mosaic artist with a deep admiration for ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Arts. I share my passion in my newsletter, as well as the work of other more modern mosaicists working with traditional or non-traditional media. You can see my own mosaics on my site at mosaicblues  If you are interested by my work or would like to drop me a line please contact me by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639. 

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Interview of Caroline Jung - a Mosaicist with a Vision

In a previous post I told you about the Signs Project of Caroline Jung. Today, I am proud to bring you a more in-depth interview of Caroline

1 - Caroline you are a very prolific artist, over the years you have studied Portrait Drawing and Painting,  Chinese ink calligraphy, silk painting, Quilting, Pottery and finally Mosaic ! These are lots of influences ! Who are the artists you admire the most ?

I like Niki de Saint Phalle, 

Friedensreich Hundertwasser 

and of course Antoni Gaudi;  

and I like James Rizzi, his painting is so colourful and with so many details.

2 - Mosaic is a rather unusual medium of expression, much more labor intensive than say Chinese calligraphy. What prompted your interest in it ?

Exactly the intensive work is it ! When you use a brush, you can make one line from a dark black to a bright grey. When you have to make the same line in mosaic, you have to use at least 3-6 colours for one line, and you have to SEE the colours, choose them and use it exactly in one row. You can «play» more with colours.

3 - Obviously you have travelled a lot, you spend lots of your time between Germany and Spain. And I am sure you travel to other countries, this is the nice thing about Europe, you drive 8 hours and you are in an other country ! Do you sell your mosaics in different countries ? Who purchase your mosaics ?

My father was an engineer, and I had the chance to spend the first 4 school years in Cairo, Egypt. This culture and people have stamped my life. I spent a lot of time in so many Bazaars. 

I enjoyed so much the colours and designs of Silver and Gold wares, the Carpets and other handicrafts... Mosaics are the same; They can be so colourful and also very monochrome. 

But as a child you walk with an open mind in the world, you see people like they are and you get to know that we are all humans  - we all belong to humanity, beyond race and religion.

4 - Some artists produce different type of works at different times of their lives. My friend Robert Lisac is presently producing  gorgeous Micromosaics. Are you specializing in some type of mosaics at this time of your career ?

The thing I like the most with mosaics is, that you can use all the stuff and materials, people throw away. Porcelain, dolls, Pearls, ceramic (which was used in Bathrooms or kitchens), Wood, Plastic, Metal and so on. 

Nguyen Van Vien - Recycled Wood Mosaic

If somebody is creative, in my eyes, you must not spend money for this kind of art.

5 - What are your 3 favourite mosaics ?

(You mean in the world ?) 

The Empress- Tarot Garden, Tuscany

The Tarot Garden of Niki de St. Phalle, 

Of course Gaudi's Park Guell in Barcelone 

Benches, Park Guell, Barcelona

 

Hagia Sophia Basilica, Istanbul, Turkey,

and the mosaics in the Hagia Sophia.

6 - You have been very influenced by the genial work of Antoni Gaudi. How did the Master influence your mosaic Art ? 

I have seen in the work of Gaudi, that he takes a lot of colourful ceramics, already themselves pieces of art, and from them he creates a new piece of art.  

Art also happens when you realize that you can use a certain object by incorporating it into your mosaic because you you find a particular meaning or art behind this particular object.

7 - Caroline, we met online because of this wonderful International Mosaic Signs Project you are leading. Can you tell us more about this. How big is the project, how many signs ? What is the purpose of it ?

The "end-panel" will be about 2.20 m x 3.80 m (7'3" x 12'6") in size, depending upon the owner likes to have the design and form. I brought about 160 Mosaic artists from 33 nations together.  

This Signs project is a new possibility to get Artists from around the world to collaborate on one piece of art without having to be there in the same place !

I was one of the Germans participating  in the project of Isidora Paz Lopez in Chile and people spend a lot of money to travel there and to work with her. If you don´t have much money, this is not possible. So that got me thinking: How can we get a number of artists who can't afford to travel to the other side of the planet to collaborate in a beautiful piece of art ?

I wanted to show that all these artists could work together to create one beautiful art piece, without war and racism, and that so many individual pieces could come together in peace.

Most of the Signs and Symbols are about Peace, Freedom and Tolerance, about being able to live together (Frederic, I hope you understand, what I am trying to say). We all are Artists, and we speak the same language through our work – why would this not be possible for the rest of the world ?

8 - How difficult it is to work with a great number of people to collect these signs ?

It is not very difficult, but it takes a lot of time. At first you have to motivate and convince people and inform the Community about your project. It is important that people believe you are serious about this, about what you are trying to achieve, and then, little by little, they begin to understand the concept. This is not so easy at the beginning, but the more  the project grows, the more artists join in. 

But then of course each artist in the group brings something of themselves in every piece of art, and that is when this project becomes so special. Without them, this project would not be possible and I have to say a very very big Thank you to you Frederic and all the other artists around the world

One motto I have is :

You never know, what you can create, 

if you do not try it.

9 - Caroline can you give us links to your work ;

Website, Facebook, Pinterest, Blog, etc...

This is the link to the Film of the Signs Project :   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sVd8I2xAlU

This is my Homepage : www.carolinejung.de

This is my Pinterest : 

https://www.pinterest.com/carolinejung1/

This is my Facebook page : 

https://www.facebook.com/caroline.jung1

Thank you Frederic for this great interview, I hope you can use what I have written. Tomorrow I will drive to Spain and stay there for one week. I won´t have much access to the Internet.  But if you need something, let me know.

All the best Caroline.

I am a French Mosaic Artist. I live and work in Alabama with my 2 dogs, 2 useless cats and many chickens in Alabama. I communicate with mosaicists around the world and blog about all things mosaics, ancient and modern. If you like this interview of Caroline, you might enjoy my mosaicblues newsletter where I share with you the last news about Modern Mosaicists,  Materials, Techniques and Sources of Inspiration of modern and antique (Specially Greeks and Romans) Mosaicists and Patrons ! 

Mona Lisa mosaic created with cups of coffee.

After I posted last month about 2 mosaics created with Coffee under different forms in Russia and Mexico...

I found out that the Mona Lisa, the world's most famous painting, was recreated in Australi in 2009 by Alison Lyons for The Rocks Aroma Festival in Sydney, with 3,604 cups of coffee - and 564 pints of milk.

130,000 people attended this one-day coffee-lovers event.

The different sepia shades of the painting were created by adding no, little or lots of milk to each cup of black coffee.

This unusual mosaic measures 20 feet high and 13 feet wide. It took 3 hours to a team of eight people to build it !

Mona Lisa, also known as La Gioconda, presumably the most famous painting in the world, measures 30 x 21" (770 x 530 mm). It was painted in Florence, Italy between 1503 and 1506 by Leonardo Da Vinci.

She is displayed in the Musee du Louvre in Paris, France, with the title "Portrait of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco del Giocondo."

I am a modern mosaic artist with a deep admiration for ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine Arts, and I love to share this passion in my newsletter, as well as the work of other more modern mosaicists, working with traditional or non-traditional media. You can see my own mosaics on my site at mosaicblues  If you are interested by my work or would like to drop me a line please contact me by email at frederic.lecut@gmail.com or by phone at (334) 798 1639.

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The SIGNS International Mosaic Project : 160 Mosaicists, 33 nations !

Last year Caroline  Jung had an idea for a wonderful art project. A theme that would connect everybody. Symbols, scripts of old cultures, many nations should come together in one piece of art and real artists could create a piece of their own culture as a part of a whole panel. 

There was just one media capable of realizing exactly this: mosaic.

After a first  a call to the art community, 40 artists committed to make a small piece and send it to her. Little by little, it came trickling.

At the end of 2014, they were 120 and they were still coming ! For weeks Caroline received all these small pieces of art from all around the world. Among them are incredible and unique artwork. The support in the community has been incredible. Even difficulties with different languages disappeared.

Most of the mosaics created are symbols of Peace and Freedom. The artists involved in this project have very different cultural, religious and ethnic backgrounds. But they   speak the same language of Art.  It is their hope that this project inspire many more young people around the world to learn to speak the same language of Tolerance and Appreciation of other cultures. One language that leaves behind War and Racism.

At this moment Caroline has 140 pieces of art and you can imagine what the final panel will look like after completion. Once complete, the project will be sold and the money from the sale will be donated to a charitable organization. It is the artists hope that this piece be displayed in a public building, a library, a meeting hall or a museum.

Caroline published this video to promote the project, please help us by sharing this post. 

Vielen Dank, Merci beaucoup, Muchas Gracias, Teşekkűrler, Thank you so much, Grazie.

I am a French Mosaic Artist. I participated in Caroline's project, my piece the tenth from the Left on the top line is called "Michi", it is an old Chinese Symbol for "the way" things are, or Tao.I am very grateful for Caroline to organize this project.

I usually live and work in Alabama with my 2 dogs, 2 useless cats and many chickens in Alabama. You can see more of my mosaics on my mosaicblues page. You can otherwise contact me by phone at (334) 798 1639 or email at  frederic.lecut@gmail.com.

You can also Subscribe to this Newsletter where I share with you the last news about Modern Mosaicists,  Materials, Techniques and Sources of Inspiration of modern and antique (Specially Greeks and Romans) Mosaicists and Patrons !