Blog
Signing mosaics – do you or don’t you?
Signing mosaics _ painters do it so why don’t we? Hello to you and hello to our new uncertain world. I had lots of good intentions, believe me, when the doors closed behind us and the world shrunk to these four walls. My To Do list was a work of art in itself. I should […]
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Graffiti mosaics and why I (and others) make them
Graffiti mosaics _ the story I started making graffiti mosaics in 2017. I had returned to Edinburgh from Athens the previous summer and needed to rebuild my life from scratch. Mosaic wise, that is. But really pretty much everything else wise too. My husband was still working in Greece and two of the boys had […]
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How to make a mosaic ‘virus’
The British Association for Modern Mosaic has started a new series called ‘Prompts from the Pros‘ to coincide with the period of Covid 19 lock down. The idea is to inspire and challenge mosaic artists and to use the time to go a little off piste, exploring different creative directions. The first prompt is to […]
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Mosaic patterns and the ancient mosaics of Tunisia.
Mosaic patterns: how it all began My aged mother is a prolific and brilliant knitter who writes an almost daily knitting blog with a devoted following. At some point she must have been thinning out her knitting books because I ended up with several by the renowned knitting designer (and sometime mosaicist) Kaffe Fassett which […]
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Diary of a six-day mosaic workshop in Greece
Classic and Contemporary Mosaic Workshop in Greece Six day mosaic workshop in Pelion, Greece. October 16 – 23, 2021. For details, prices and bookings please go to the Lagou Raxi Hotel website: https://lagouraxi.com/classic-and-contemporary-mosaics-workshop/ Group shot by the pool at the end of the six-day Mosaic Workshop, 2019. @helenmilesmosaics The Classic and Contemporary Mosaic Course takes […]
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Musings on the use of andamento in mosaic faces
I’ve been thinking a lot about andamento recently, about the lines of tesserae from which all, or almost all, mosaic creativity springs. Straight lines, curved ones, long drawn out tapering ones, lines which twist and writhe, ones laid for emphasis, others to distract attention. Without lines a mosaic is not a mosaic, just a random […]
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Mosaic foundations: five layers of making
Here is a short guide to get you up to speed on mosaic foundations – the hidden layers beneath ancient tessellated pavements. Mosaic foundations: five layers of making. Layer 1: The SURFACE I was standing in the Louvre, hunched over the mosaic of the Judgement of Paris, when a young American came up to join […]
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The Kirkennan Garden Mosaic
The Garden Mosaic – from start to finish. This mosaic was made using the reverse method on paper and installed over an arch in a walled garden in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. The arch leads into an orchard where free-range chickens roam. Jenny Chapman, who jointly owns and runs Kirkennan Estate, commissioned the mosaic and […]
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The white myth? Skin colour in ancient mosaics
Skin colour in ancient mosaics and why it matters This post is a response to an October 2018 New Yorker article, The Myth of Whiteness in Classical Sculpture, written by Margaret Talbot, which discusses the use of colour on ancient Roman and Greek statues. The article argues that academics have known for centuries that the […]
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A transgender cow, incongruous crustaceans and a boar-dog: the surprising tale of reconstructing a Byzantine mosaic floor
A retired engineer from Tel Aviv is an unlikely candidate to undertake the reconstruction of a Byzantine mosaic floor in Greece. But with hard work, determination and a generous amount of enthusiasm he transformed a few forgotten mosaic fragments …. ..into a digital representation of a lost masterpiece: Fragments of a lost Byzantine mosaic floor […]
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A snapshot of the mosaics of Israel
A recent trip to see some of the ancient and contemporary mosaics of Israel was made possible through the warm hospitality and open hearted generosity of a man I scarcely knew and now count as a friend. There are, so I’m told, more than 1,000 ancient mosaics to be seen in Israel and that’s not […]
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The Mosaics of Jordan: A photo gallery
In search of rare orchids: The Mosaics of Jordan I would hazard a guess that being a lover of ancient mosaics is much like being a bird watcher or a seeker of rare orchids. You read books about them, browse the internet in search of them, communicate with fellow obsessives about them and occasionally, if […]
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