Ceramic Tile Murals

• Tile-work can be seen everywhere, including hospital surgery rooms, subway stations, kitchens and building facades.

• Tiles and tile-work have a long and rich decorative history that spans all areas of the globe.

• Early decorative works date back as far as 4000 years.

New York Subway Hallway

Florida Kitchen Design Inc.Building Facade Manhattan NY.

•Tile-making was influenced by movement along major land and sea trade routes, which encouraged the exchange of ideas and materials.

• Wars, political unrest, and religion all played their part in the blending of technologies, aesthetics, and cultural influences in ceramic tile-making.

Abby Church, Meraux England 1249

Queen Philippa’s Apartment Wiltshire England 1237

Azulejo Mexico 17th A.D.

Ishtar Gate Babylon 575 B.C.

Palace of Persepolis 518 B.C.

•Chinese Porcelains were introduced into Persia and the West with far-reaching effects. Tang Dynasty (A.D. 618-906)

• In order to imitate Chinese Porcelains, the Persians first developed a white tin- based glaze to mask the red clay, and then used a technique of applying oxides to produce brightly colored intricate designs.

• This decorating technique spread throughout Europe, Africa and later into the Americas. This process is now called Majolica, Faïence or Delftware depending on the region where it is made.

Persian Tile, 1266-67 Damascus 1550-97

France, 1542

Yuan Dynasty 14 A.D.

Minai Type Bowl 1187 A.D.

•Throughout the Renaissance and Post Renaissance Majolica and other forms of tile work flourished

•During the industrial revolution tile production and decoration reflected the technological and socio-economic changes in Europe

• The rising increase of the middle classes fueled the decorative advances in ceramic tile.

France, 1542

Italy, early Renaissance

Naples, 1742

Spain, 1929

Finland 1825

•Tile work experienced a heyday in the Victorian period and Gothic Revival of the late 1800s.

•Arts and Crafts artists like William Morris and William De Morgan created many designs for tiles.

•Émigrés from Europe brought commercial tile production to the U. S.

William De Morgan 1888

William De Morgan 1888

William Morris 1876

Gijsbert De Graaaf 1765

Gothic Revival Tiles

• The Arts and Crafts Movement and tile-making played a major part in shaping modern American design.

Painted By Margret Thompson 1922

Clay Craft Potteries 1921

Hand made and fine art tile is still produced today for Utilitarian and decorative use.

Pewabic Pottery

Motawi Tileworks

Motawi Tileworks

Motawi Tileworks

Pewabic Pottery

•Many contemporary artists perpetuate the history of tile by creating murals with this malleable, permanent medium.

Ascalon Studios NY,NY

San Francisco Airport Mural Blue Sky Center C.O.

Richard Watts

Diana FarisDiana Faris

Jean Rothschild

Ann Agee, John Michael Kohler Arts Center

•Many school art programs undertake the lesson of creating tile murals for the school building or other public spaces. Like no other project the public mural helps students learn about collaboration and teamwork and is a unique all-school experience where students, parents, faculty and administrators come together to complete the project.

Vermillion High School

Roseway Waldorf School, Zwalulu Natal South AfricaScott Ansett Tacoma High School

Lausanne Switzerland Beth Hoke Vermillion High School

Canterbury School

Kids in Clay Venice C.A.Allisonville Elementary School

Use with a high or low fire glaze on top underglazes are true to raw form and intermixable just like traditional media. Expand the range of 2-D design work on ceramics with chalks, pencils, watercolor pan sets and liquid form.

Richard Zakin: Underglazes and Chalks

S. Pelletier: Pencils

Unknown: Chalks and PencilsNoelle Hoover: Pencils and Pan Sets

Chris Dance: Pencils and Velvets

Linda Arbuckle: GDCs over white glaze

Carolina Pedraza: GDCs over AMACO LG-11 White glaze

Carol and Richard Selfridge: GDCs over white glaze

Ron Korczynski: GDCs over white glaze

Diana Faris: GDCs over AMACO HF-11 High Fire White glaze

Walter Ostram: GDCs over AMACO LM-1 Black Matt glaze

Noelle Hoover: GDCs over pre-glazed commercial blue tile

David Stabley: GDCs over AMACO White Arroya over DG-1 Black Lacquer glaze

Tile Project

• You will create a 5.5 x 5.5” tile about a theme of your choice.

• You must have additive and subtractive qualities

Developed to facilitate the process of Majolica decoration, this easy to use and highly versatile medium is wonderfully suited to creating tile murals. AMACO GDC series can be used as an underglaze, a glaze alone, for Majolica overglaze decoration and even over commercial preglazed tiles. ...

Colors can be intermixed like paint and can be applied opaque or thinned with water to achieve

watercolor affects

“1000 Tiles, Ten Centuries of Decorative Ceramics”

General editor: Gordon Lang, Contributors: Paul Atterbury, Catherine Blake, Chris Blanchett, Douglas Girton, Riccardo Sorani.

“Tile”, by Jill Herbers with Photographs by Roy Write

Resources:

Pewabic Pottery, Detoit, MI – www.pewabic.com

Motawi Tileworks, Ann Arbor, MI - www.motawi.com

Moravian Tileworks, Doylestown, PA - www.mptw.go.to

Tile Heritage Foundation - www.tileheritage.org

For information on products and technical support go to: www.amaco.com