She's got the look

mosaic by Pasquale Roscigno

Guys or gals, doesn't she have that look that says it all?

Indifference. Lust. Disappointment. Sadness. Intelligence. Class.... Stay out of my way.

This is a mosaic by Pasquale Roscigno, an Italian mosaic artist living in Campania.

unexpected treasures while googling

Title: St. Olga of Kiev. Drawing for mosaic. «Святая Ольга». Н.К. Рерих. Эскиз мозаики.
Nicholas Roerich

Posting something I accidentally found on the internet for the mere beauty and intensity of the design. A drawing for mosaic.

via http://ookaboo.com

GUEST POST: Celebrities and mosaic art (some considerations)

By Eric
Blog: Bored Neoclassical Guy
Site: www.oldmosaics.com

I was recently considering the trend in mosaic art to render celebrities. A celebrity work is great because it instantly communicates to the viewer that the work is either a good likeness, or not.  Everyone becomes a member of that special club that recognizes the art for what it is. One cannot get that kind of result with a mosaic depicting fuzzy clouds, or strange abstract geological features.

Of course, 'celebrity work' doesn't mean that the celebrity creates the art. Maybe they would be worth more if the mosaic was a celebrity self-portrait?

 

I began to list out the mosaics of celebrities that came to mind. Popular works, like the portrait of Amy Winehouse by Jason Mecier, used pills for tesserae. 

 

This choice of pills for tesserae really drives home one of the causes of the demise of the celebrity, which was very clever to tie those things together.

Let me Ctrl-Break it down for you… The Australian artist WBK (Guy Whitbey) uses images of keyboard keys to render famous people.  He uses photo images of old keyboard keys to do the mosaic, very clever! As the old expression goes, a million monkeys typing for a million years would still not come up with works like this. Maybe this is because a monkey would be interested in eating the keyboards?

Ed Chapman in the UK has created many nice mosaics of celebrities with recycled items. The subjects he has chosen to represent happen to be celebrities that have also thrown things away, logical connection right? Doesn’t the result remind you of fractured egg shells, like one might find in the trash? 

Below, the gifted artist Vojna Bastovanovic seems to have perfectly recreated one of the celebrity film stars of ‘101 Dalmations’. I recently phoned Pongo the dog about this wonderful portrait work.  While the star and his agent didn’t comment specifically on the art, the happy barking indicated a general sense of approval.

      

I have also tried the celebrity mosaic to a lesser degree with my creation of a Scarlett Johansen mosaic.  I used mostly rocks on the mosaic. While I'm not entirely sure, I would imagine that Scarlett has touched rocks at some point in her life. Was it clever to tie those things together?

 

After a look at what is out there from recent times, my thoughts turned to the history of it all.  For how long have mosaic artists been patterning their work from the images of celebrities? I did some quick research and found a few earlier celebrity mosaics.

Here is Justinian Bieber by an unknown artist circa 500 A.D. As it probably does for you, the resemblance is quite scary to me, for many reasons.

Constantine was also very popular in his day…

In any case, celebrity mosaics have been around for a while and probably always will be. But, it’s interesting that in the past year I think we’ve seen more than normal.

Eric (eric@oldmosaics.com)

An amazing mosaic portrait using legos or Adam Baldwin as a source of inspiration

The artist behind this lego mosaic artist is Dave Ware and his website is called .... BRICKWARES. Quite spot on! He makes mosaics using legos. When I saw this picture I immediately thought of "Chuck" the TV series where Adam Baldwin played the part of a detective. That TV series had inspired me to write a post on Freelance Writing Dreams (where you will find me from time to time doing some writing work). The post was called ARE YOUR FREELANCE WRITING DREAMS DOOMED? There's a very good reason why I used the word "DOOMED" and it had something to do with an Adam Baldwin's line.

So you can say that Adam Baldwin HAS provided the INSPIRATION for a MOSAIC PORTRAIT and a FREELANCE MOTIVATIONAL POST.

Go to BRICKWARES site and see more fascinating lego mosaics!

Marylin Monroe by SICIS

SICIS knows how to rock your world with huge mosaic portraits in dimensions that make your head turn, set your living space on glittery fire and set the record straight of how classy you are.

The Hidden and the Revealed, The Book

I have received interesting news via email the other day. 

The written world of mosaic is now richer due a new book release by famous mosaicist Lilian Broca.

The book begins with Vancouver artist Broca’s own lively description of her emigration from war-torn Romania to Israel and ultimately to Canada. She goes on to reveal what led her to tell the story of Esther in the medium of mosaics, describing as well the meticulous process involved in using ancient artistic techniques with a contemporary sensibility. The book is rounded out with the full text of Esther in handsomely calligraphed Hebrew alongside an English translation.

As Broca writes, “I trust that this series, the final segment that completes a circle in my life’s artistic creation, would please the old Byzantine masters. And in doing so, I also hope my mosaics have brought new light to the fascinating, multifaceted story of Esther.”

The Hidden and the Revealed:
The Queen Esther Mosaics of Lilian Broca

Lilian Broca, Sheila Campbell, Yosef Wosk
Published by Gefen Publishing House Ltd., Israel and New York
November 1, 2011
ISBN: 9789652295606
$35, hardcover
Available in bookstores and from Amazon  

Read Lilian's Mosaicology interview HERE (διαθέσιμη και στα ελληνικά).

Savvy and successful (except in love) single ladies

Piazza Armerina, Sicily

via

It was not very difficult to find the right image for this post. This superb mosaic from Piazza Armerina evokes that sophisticated-insightful tone of an article called Are New York’s Savviest Single Women In Crisis? by Jenna Goudreau on Forbes. I am sharing this with you and I think the subject is terribly interesting regardless where you live, city or country. Whatever your situation is, single or non single, I recommend you read this article.

Rock me amadeus: Amadeus Mozart mosaic portrait

via

What a surprising mosaic find !

Do I see a smile on your face for the play of words?

rock, rocks = stones for mosaics.

Let's remember the song from the 80s Rock me Amadeus by Falco. I had no idea he had died in a car accident in 1998 until I read it somewhere some time ago. Here I have found the occasion to show my admiration for this artist and his song through this mosaic and this superb 80s video.