Ornament

Bien que représentant un cas particulier, le Livre d'Echantillons Fol Est 489 constitue un bon exemple de la manière dont un recueil à destination d'un homme de l'art était composé au milieu du XVIIIe siècle. Éléments pratiques et didactiques y forment un vaste ensemble dans lequel le propriétaire pouvait puiser des idées et des formes, adaptables et combinables au gré de son imagination et des exigences de ses commanditaires. Il témoigne aussi du coût qu'un tel objet pouvait constituer, investissement assez onéreux pour un simple artisan. Il reflète, enfin, comment le goût de la période rocaille se diffusa dans les ateliers qui portèrent cette « mode » que Blondel fustige dans ses Cours d’Architecture.

Over 30 years, the design of ornaments on karawo textiles in Gorontalo-Indonesia is only done by one self-taught designer, without regeneration. This is allegedly because the design process is considered to be done intuitively, so that cannot be learned by others. This study aims to explore the process of designing the ornaments to be systematically understandable by others. Data were collected through observations, interviews, and review of design results. They were analyzed interactively during and after data collection. The results show that the process of creating the design is complex, but systematically done through five steps: 1) identifying the concept from users; 2) exploring the specific products for appropriate design; 3) selecting objects for appropriate motives; 4) articulating the design; 5) evaluating the overall design. These five steps are considered as method of designing ornaments on karawo textiles, which can be applied by anyone who has good interpretation to cr...

This essay, included in the first reprinting of Color Problems, a Practical Manual for the Lay Student of Color, By Emily Noyes Vanderpoel, 1902, introduces Vanderpoel's pedagogy of color theory and the color abstraction works and techniques of Vanderpoel. The author proposes that Vanderpoel is an overlooked abstract artist.

Straipsnyje ikonografijos ir stiliaus požiūriu analizuojama Lietuvos kapinėse esan-čių XIX a. antkapinių ketaus kryžių puošyba: ornamento motyvai, religiniai bei sepulkraliniai simboliai, stiliaus požymiai. Lietuvos kapinėse iš likusių ketaus kryžių dekorą pirmą kartą bandoma susieti su atitinkama ketaus liejybos tradicija: vokiečių (prūsų), prancūzų ir rusų.

The article discusses the decor of cast-iron tombstone crosses in Lithuanian cemeteries: motifs of ornaments, style characteristics and religious and sepulchral symbols. The article identifies three cast iron "schools", to which the crosses or their designs that spread in Lithuania may be attributed, i.e. German (Prussian), French and Russian.

Keberadaan bangunan bersejarah yang menjadi bukti warisan mengenai perjalanan tumbuhnya Kota sangatlah penting. Oleh karena itu keberadaannya perlu dijaga dan dilakukan tindakan konservasi. Masjid Al Osmani adalah salah satu bangunan bersejarah di Kota Medan yang menjadi tempat beribadah bagi umat Muslim, sejak zaman kesultanan Melayu Deli pada abad ke-19 sampai dengan sekarang. Bangunan Masjid Al Osmani memiliki arsitektur yang unik perpaduan dari budaya Timur Tengah, Spanyol, India, China dan Melayu Deli. Contohnya pintu masjid berornamen bergaya China, ukiran bangunan bernuansa Spanyol, kubah mencirikan nuansa India, serta tampilan ornamen lain mencirikan nuansa Timur Tengah dan Melayu Deli. Dari bentuk ornamen yang ada dibangunan Masjid Al Osmani, khususnya pada bagian kubah memiliki makna yang berkaitan dengan tatanan kehidupan masyarakat Melayu Deli. Tujuan penelitian ini untuk mengetahui estetika bentuk dan fungsi ornamen yang terdapat pada bagian kubah Masjid Al Osmani dengan budaya Melayu Deli yang melatari keberadaannya, dan mengetahui makna ornamen yang ada di bagian kubah Masjid Al Osmani. Penelitian ini menggunakan pendekatan kualitatif dengan teknik analisis deskriptif yang dilakukan melalui observasi dan studi literatur. Teori yang digunakan adalah teori Semiotika menurut Charles S. Peirce untuk mengetahui pemaknaan tanda terhadap objek penelitian meliputi aspek, Pertama, Ikon yaitu tanda yang menyerupai atau hampir seperti dengan bentuk aslinya. Kedua, Indeks adalah tanda yang memiliki hubungan sebab akibat di antara representamen dan objeknya. Ketiga, Simbol yaitu tanda yang tidak memiliki hubungan logis dan kemiripan dengan objek, tetapi pemaknaannya sesuai dengan kesepakatan bersama (konvensi). Hasil penelitian ini menunjukkan bahwa kubah Masjid Al Osmani menggunakan kerangka kubah dengan bentuk dasar segi delapan dan sedikit menjorok keluar dibagian tengah kubah yang biasanya disebut juga dengan kubah bawang (Onion Dome). Struktur kubah Masjid Al Osmani menggunakan rangka tembaga yang bertumpu pada setiap sudut dinding yang berbentuk persegi delapan (mengikuti bentuk kubah) dan dilapisi dengan kayu dammar yang berfungsi sebagai plafon pada kubah. Terdapat 5 ornamen yang ada pada bagian kubah Masjid Al Osmani, baik kubah bagian luar maupun kubah bagian dalam, yang terdiri dari tiga macam bentukan ornamen diantaranya ornamen dengan bentukan gabungan antara geometris dengan tumbuhan (ornamen bunga matahari), ornamen dengan bentukan tumbuh-tumbuhan (ornamen kaluk pakis, ornamen bunga cengkeh dan ornamen pucuk rebung) dan ornamen yang diambil dari stilasi bentukan hewan (ornamen itik pulang petang).

The article discusses the key issues of the theory of ornament: Does the ornament have an independent character and how legitimate is the definition of an ornament as a separate art form? How is the ornament different from the decor (decoration)? What are its basic properties? There are two opposing points of view in Russian historiography, presented in the works of Moses Kagan (1961), where the exclusively supported, secondary role of ornament is postulated, and Yuri Gerchuk (2013), where the ornament is considered as an independent form of art. The solution of this question required referral to historiography, where during two centuries of studies a whole range of directions for the study of ornament has been formed: not only in art history, but in mathematics and within the framework of related humanitarian disciplines – archaeology, anthropology and ethnography. So, the main directions of the ornamental studies were identified by Pavel Kozhin (1981) examining the ornamentation of the Chinese Neolithic pottery. The rhythmicity of ornament served as the basis for anthropologist Yakov Roginsky (1982) to postulate two “directions” of arts that are “not strictly distributed according to the well-known kinds of arts” – “art-image” and “art-rhythm”. A comprehensive examination of the problem of ornament allows us to consider it a special type of art based on visualization of rhythm. The ornament has its own properties (inversion and reversibility, rhythm, symmetry, modularity), including the ability of reproduction on various media at various scales. The semantics of ornaments mainly is not beyond the limits of the sign and has an associative and variable nature: it, on the one hand, reduces the possibilities of its “exposing”, but, on the other hand, allows focusing of the researches towards the  process of reconstruction of an artistic forms transformation within the frames of specific ornamental traditions.

Glass bead decoration of Hutsul Folk Garments of the 19th and early
21th century: typological and artistic features.

This article explores ancient and modern folk clothing parts, which made of the use of glass bead materials. Reconstruction of the 200 year old Hutsul glass bead garment decoration tradition is based an artistic analysis of artifacts (the writer’s own expedition findings and museum exhibits), literary and figurative sources. This is an attempt, for the first time, to single out the glass bead folk garment components of Bukovynan, Galician and Transcarpathian Hutsul materials by typological
and artistic features.

Keywords: glass beads, ornament, décor, clothing, artistic tradition.

Studies on the Alhambra Palace, handled both through romantic and academic approaches, played a significant role in the recognition of Islamic art throughout Europe. Starting with the 19th century, artists and architects paid visits to the palace, located so close to the Western centers, and they shared their visual experiences through illustrated books. Alham- bra’s forms and motifs began to find a place in Western art and architecture, in many art objects and spaces designed with an “oriental inspiration”. Alhambra and its visual vocabulary have turned into a passion.
The Ottoman world welcomed the Alhambra style as an original Western innovation. The new style did provide another spirit into the Ottoman designs as it carried aspects in direct relation to the language of Islamic Art. The style had been applied especially in imperial buildings (e.g. main gate and kiosks of the Ministry of Defense, Çırağan Palace) and in the residences of prominent figures of the government (e.g. Baltalimanı Shore-Palace, Mecit Efendi Mansion, Sait Halim Paşa Mansion).
Beylerbeyi Palace holds the role of a precursor on the adoption of the Alhambra style in Istanbul. It welcomed Empress Eugénie of France right after its completion with its both “of latest fashion” and “traditional-Islamic” decoration. The pala- ce was predominantly decorated with the motifs taken from The Grammar of Ornament, which, for the period had been a highly influential compilation, prepared by Owen Jones. The identification of Alhambra motifs that arrived in the imperial Beylerbeyi Palace through Jones’ illustrated work, sets forth that unlike in the West, this style had been taken seriously by the Ottomans, and it appealed to the Ottoman taste in the creation of a new artistic essence.

Keywords: Alhambra Palace, Beylerbeyi Palace, Ottoman Architecture, Owen Jones, The Grammar of Ornament, Eugénie, Alhambra Style, Ornamental Elements

Die Diskussion um Abstraktion und Körper ist auf engste mit dem Medium Schrift verbunden und subsumiert wesentliche Aspekte der Schriftphilosophie, insbesondere die Frage nach der Materialität von Schriftzeichen und der Körperlichkeit ihrer Hervorbringung. Der Text wirft einen Rückblick auf die historische Gewordenheit der Verschränkung von Schrift und Abstraktion samt ihrer Rolle als Negativfolie einer phonozentrischen Konkretionsidolatrie. Auf der Suche nach Alternativen zu der harten Dichotomie von Schrift und Konkretion fällt der Blick auf Tanz und Choreographie als Inszenierungen einer écriture corporelle. Am Beispiel von Trisha Browns 'Locus' (1975), einem der einflussreichsten Stücke des Postmodern Dance, stellen sich die Fragen: Mit welcher Taktik schreibt sich hier Tanzen in den Diskurs der Schrift ein? Wie verändert eine solche Einschreibung das Verhältnis von Konkretion und Körperlichkeit? Und: Warum provoziert gerade die Korporealität eines Schrifttanzes dessen Wahrnehmung als abstraktes Ornament?

Аннотация: В изучении декоративно-прикладного искусства анализ орнамента играет ключевую роль. Тем не менее основные вопросы, касающиеся природы орнамента, его выразительных средств, семантики, принципы композиционного построения, роли в культуре — раскрыты фрагментарно. Главная тому причина — в обособлении областей наук, исследующих орнамент: искусствознания, культурной антропологии, этнографии, археологии и др. Назрела необходимость в синтезе методов и подходов, чтобы на этой основе выработать общие принципы исследования орнамента, учитывающие его разносторонние аспекты. Фундамент для такого синтеза заложен в работах российского археолога и востоковеда П.М. Кожина.
Практический и теоретический аспекты орнамента тесно взаимосвязаны. В дефиниции орнамента и связанной с ним терминологии с XIX в. произошли существенные изменения. Определение орнамента через его декоративную функцию не отражает его сущностных характеристик — ритма, метра и симметрии. Орнамент можно рассматривать как способ визуализации ритма, а своеобразие выразительных средств позволяет выделить его в особый вид искусства.
Современные направления в исследовании орнамента сложились в различных областях искусствознания, культурной антропологии и археологии. Помимо формального направления, основанного на систематизации орнаментов (по форме элементов и мотивов, а также по принципам организации композиции), важную роль играют подходы к орнаменту как к основе этнокультурных и исторических реконструкций. Целый спектр мнений представлен в исследованиях по семантике орнамента. Расхожее мнение о том, что орнамент является набором знаков и символов, на основе которого часто реконструируются мифологические представления, требует критического рассмотрения с точки зрения приемлемости используемых методов и доказательной базы имеющихся реконструкций. Между тем орнамент играет важную роль в процессе межкультурной и внутрикультурной коммуникации на уровне сигнала и индекса, представляя собой особый вид «искусства-ритма».
Междисциплинарный подход существенно расширяет представления о возможностях изучения орнаментов, создает базу для дальнейших исследований, из которых перспективными являются сквозной и кросс-культурный анализ орнамента как элемента коммуникативной системы, основанные на поиске связей между развитием орнаментальных традиций и стилей и развитием других областей человеческой культуры.

The presented paper is a personal investigation on ornament and its various facets during history.  By analysing ornament through Adolf Loos’s manifesto, I want to understand the relationship that ornament had in the social - cultural context it was conceived for. Showing the different variations of ornament and finding the limit between the two types of ornament, the aesthetics and the functional, are main focal points of the research. By mapping ornament to its roots as Charles Darwin did through the Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection, I can better understand how ornament evolved and shaped our society. The ultimate goal of this investigative research is to understand and predict the way build form will shape our society in the future.

The science of mathematics held a discussion about the presence of the
17 crystallographic groups of plane symmetry in the mosaics of the Alhambra from the appearance of a doctoral thesis on the subject in 1944. This research collects discussion of mathematicians, which have established criteria for recognition of the presence of these groups, to establish the possibility of symbolic representation from chromatic asymmetry in some of the tiles of the Alhambra. Thus, what would be a
mathematical error would be a way of representation intentional taking as an example the case of the Nazari “pajarita” Bath of Comares.

Whether on clothing, furnishings, buildings, or even culinary dishes, ornament has often marked membership in particular grades and segments of society. It has distinguished sacred from profane, aristocrat from commoner, male from female, tribesman from stranger, high caste from low. Ornament is a relational device that differentiates and associates things and people, frequently marking social status by signaling affiliations and distinctions. Ornament orders.

Ornament has returned to architecture, but it continues to be burdened by a bad conscience of those who make use of it.  This article discusses what is at stake in Modernist architecture's complicated relationship to ornament and in tricky terminology with which ornament's contemporary appearance is granted permission to reappear in contemporary architecture.

The role of Raphael’s and Michelangelo’s inventions in the shaping of the canon of figural compositions in the modern era is well known; further disseminated by the generation of their disciples and epigones by means of blueprints, stencils and more or less approximate copies in various techniques. On the other hand, the ways that 16th-century ornaments were disseminated still remain only broadly outlined, and the role of graphics in the process has not been precisely determined. A particular example is the popularisation of moresque motifs around the half of the 16th century. Graphic models are among the main sources of the proliferation of this fashion, which was much more popular than it is believed. It can be demonstrated that the moresque – as the first ornament in a line of many – was disseminated through graphical works. Over the three decades from ca. 1530, about twelve publications were issued, of which some were re-issued, and most were soon copied. The number of available pattern books (consisting of multiple drawings with a wide range of motifs) found its reflection in a great number of artworks decorated with the moresque. Goldsmithing was one of the domains in which the ornament found its place. In the decoration of pieces dated to mid-16th century and later, for example in double beakers or lidded cups, the moresque constitutes an almost obligatory element of the decoration, perfectly combined with other elements such as the grotesque or the scrollwork. To conclude, I believe that the intensified publishing of pattern books was the main source of dissemination for the moresque. It was the first precedent of such significant impact of the new medium – the ornamental prints.

La Bibliothèque de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, héritière de la Bibliothèque d’art et d’archéologie créée par le couturier Jacques Doucet (1853-1929) à partir de 1908, est aujourd’hui riche de plus de 25 000 estampes d'ornement, réunies en près de 700 volumes. Son fonds  d'estampes couvre la production, tant française qu’italienne ou allemande, du XVIe au XVIIIe siècle. Sources importantes pour les historiens des arts décoratifs, de l'architecture, de l'estampe, ces œuvres ont fait l’objet d’un catalogage informatisé et d'une numérisation, dans le cadre du programme « Histoire de l'ornement » de l'INHA. L’exposition, organisée dans la salle Roberto Longhi de la Galerie Colbert, correspond à l’achèvement de ce programme et à la parution d’un livre consacré à la collection d’estampes d’ornement de l’INHA, publié en coédition par Mare et Martin et l’INHA.

À travers la présentation d’une cinquantaine d’estampes, où se déploie une multiplicité de motifs (rinceaux, frises, fleurs, volutes, grotesques, trophées, cuirs...), l’exposition permet d’éclairer les fonctions de l’estampe d’ornement, mais aussi le contexte de sa production et de sa diffusion, et enfin, son statut d’objet d’étude et de collection. Sont particulièrement mis en valeur les points forts de la collection Doucet, telles les estampes allemandes des XVIe-XVIIe siècles (Martin Schongauer, Virgil Solis, Albrecht Dürer), les gravures d’orfèvres « cosses de pois » du premier XVIIe siècle (Jean Toutin), mais aussi les estampes françaises du XVIIIe siècle représentant rocailles et chinoiseries (Pillement, Huquier), ainsi que leurs copies européennes. Des objets d’art permettent de resituer la place de l’estampe au sein du processus de création. Enfin, reliures remarquables, états rares, épreuves coloriées, illustrent l’histoire des praticiens, amateurs  ou collectionneurs de ces estampes, tel Edmond Foulc, dont la collection fut acquise par Jacques Doucet en 1914.

Secrets of the studios, Art Nouveau ornament, Bruxelles, éditions du musée Horta, 2020

The Horta Museum’s spring 2020 exhibition is dedicated to ornamentation from the Art Nouveau era. The real question is why such a subject is so decisive in this period straddling the 19th and 20th centuries: a point of time in the history of art that is exalted right across Europe while crystallizing into patterns so varied that it is sometimes difficult to see a coherent style. It is the last moment of grace of
interior decoration, a blazing sunset before ornamentation falls into disgrace.

Franz Kafka’s novel Der Process (The Trial), written in 1914–15 and first published in 1925, emerged within the context of modernism in art and the nascent avant-garde movements convulsed by the fight against ornament, commonly identified with the aestheticism of Decadence. But what precisely does ornament mean in the configurations of modernism? And what are the ways an ornament can perform and shape the modernist literary text? In order to answer these questions, this paper examines one chapter of Der Process, ‘Im Dom’ (‘In the Cathedral’), through a particular visual mode that shapes Kafka’s writing in this text. That mode is Gothic cathedral architecture — more precisely, art historian Wilhelm Worringer’s influential 1911 formulation of Gothic architectural principles embodied in the figure of ornament. This stage-managed encounter between the language of literature and Gothic space as two phenomena that contribute to shaping each other constitutes a kind of experiment, a way of focussing not on the content or context of the work but on what could be called the ‘motion of the writing’ that runs through the text; on recording its visual quality and how it resonates with the space in which it is set. Drawing on the methodological fusion of visual anthropology, visual studies, and deconstructivist close reading, I argue that such transhistorical principles as dynamic and complex current, a chaotic tangle of lines, expression prevailing over meaning, an absent center, vertigo, and pathos are shared by both, Worringer’s Gothic and Kafka’s writing. A dynamic and complex current; a chaotic tangle of lines; expression prevailing over meaning; an absent center; vertigo and pathos — these are the principles shared by Worringer’s Gothic and Kafka’s writing.

Kadim bir geçmişi olan çarkıfelek (fırıldak) sembolü dünyanın ve evrenin devinimini, kaderi, sonsuzluğu ve ölümsüzlüğü simgelemektedir. El sanatları ve mimari plastik süslemelerde görülen çarkıfelek motifi, kubbelerde de kullanılmıştır. Bu çalışmada Türk-İslam yapılarında karşımıza çıkan çarkıfelek süslemeli kubbeler ele alınmıştır. Çeşitli coğrafyalarda bulunan otuz dokuz adet çarkıfelek süslemeli kubbe, sanat tarihi açısından değerlendirilmiştir. Bizim saptayamadığımız veya günümüze gelememiş örneklerin olabileceği düşünülürse bu sayının daha da fazla olduğu belirtilebilir. Örneklerden on yedisi İran’da, ikisi Mısır’da, biri Özbekistan’da, biri Bulgaristan’da geriye kalan kısmı ise Türkiye sınırları içerisinde yer almaktadır. Bunlardan en erken tarihlisi 11-12. yüzyıla kadar gitmektedir. Tespit ettiğimiz ilk örnek İran coğrafyasında yer almaktadır. Çarkıfelek süslemeli kubbe Türklerle birlikte Mısır, Türkiye ve Balkan coğrafyasına taşınmıştır. Konu kapsamındaki çarkıfelek süslemeli kubbeler, yazılı ve görsel kaynaklar taranarak tespit edilmiş ve belirlenen örneklerin çizimleri fotoğraflar üzerinden yapılmıştır. Çarkıfelek formlu kubbeler kronolojik olarak katalog halinde tanıtılmıştır. Çarkıfelek sembolünün mekanı örten yarım küre biçimli üst örtülerde kullanılmasının ikonografik anlamları irdelenmiştir. Türk-İslam sanatı içerisindeki yeri ve önemi üzerinde durularak genel bir değerlendirilmeye gidilmiştir. Çarkıfelek süslemeli kubbelerin başka mimarilerde görülen örneklerine değinilmiş, sadece geçmişteki yapılarda değil yakın dönemdeki yapılarda da kullanıldığı saptanmıştır.

ABSTRACT

Ornament is currently acquiring a renewed status through the articulation of architectural surface. It has re-emerged as a means to explore the interactions between function and decoration, volume and surface, structure and envelope. Its link to craft is evident in the writing of Semper. This essay will investigate the use of ornament in architecture of the modern movement. Kent Bloomer writes that the purpose of ornament is to “articulate a realm of the imagination”. In Function of Ornament, Farshid Moussavi explains that architecture needs a mechanism for it to become connected to culture. The paper will investigate and assess whether ornament is this connection.

The making of the physical aspects of architecture involves two overhead components namely structure and surface.
Structure serves the functional criteria of shelter, framing and protecting the interior. Meanwhile, surface communicates techniques of symbolic expression that exceeds the fundamental utility of architecture and acts as the interface between individual and community. The act of making architecture is inherently bound up with the cultural and material context within which the work is produced, and ornament – expressed through the procedural articulations of Semper’s four operations- is an index of the relationship between making and materiality. (Pell, 2010)

The paper argues that ornament is neither mere decoration nor pure “art”, but rather a category by itself, with its own language that mediates between structure and surface, between material characteristics and the art of making. With the search for a completely original ornamental language, architects can refine images and forms, extract basic units of ornament, and multiply and manipulate them to the visual devices of contemporary conditions. The investigation will look at how ornament was used locally in the very early formation of Modernism in South Africa and how it tried to establish a regional vernacular. The other projects promote the use ornament in innovative ways that enables architecture to be linked to current cultural movements and conditions. The paper will also investigate and assess whether the articulation of surface or façade is the interface between building and culture and explore how ornament can inform and influence design.

Özet: İslam devletlerinin süsleme sanatlarında görülen ortak bir özellik, bezemelerde kullanılan ve desenleri oluşturan motiflerin genel anlamda birbirine benzemesidir. Türk-İslam kültür çevresinde, mimariden tekstile; kitap sanatlarından ahşaba, küçük el sanatlarından gündelik kullanım eşyasına kadar farklı malzeme üzerinde değişik ölçülerde uygulanması bu görüşü desteklemektedir. Sanat geleneklerini Timurlulardan devralan Karakoyunlu ve Akkoyunlu Türkmenlerinin kitap sanatları gelişimine büyük katkıları oldukları bilinmektedir. Türkmen Hanedanlar tıpkı mimaride olduğu gibi kitap sanatları üsluplarını da yayılmış oldukları İran ve Anadolu'ya taşımış ve sanatçılar vasıtasıyla bu etkileri Osmanlı'ya kadar getirerek gelişime katkıda bulunmuşlardır. Akkoyunlulara bir dönem başkentlik yapmış Diyarbakır'da dönemin mimari yapılarındaki taş süslemelerin, kitap kapaklarının bezeme tasarımlarına benzemesi dikkat çekici özelliklerdir. Bu benzerlikler, genel anlamda süsleme sanatlarında görülen ortak bir anlayışın dışında motifsel bazda değil tasarımsal olarak farklı bir malzemedeki yansımayı göstermektedir. Safa Parlı Camii'nde mihrap, minber ve minare süslemelerinde dönemin el yazmalarının kapaklarında sıkça rastlanılan şemseli salbekli cild tasarımlarının uygulanması, kitap süsleme tasarımlarının mimari süslemelere kaynak olabileceğine işaret etmektedir. Abstract: A main mutual characteristic of decorative arts of Islamic states is the general resemblence of motifs which form the patterns and used in decorations. This view is strengthened by the implication of those motifs which are performed in different sizes and on different materials from arcitechture to textile, from manuscripts to wood decoration from small handcraft to common tools in the general frame of Turkish-Islamic culture. It is known that with taking over their artistic traditions * Arş. Gör., Niğde Üniversitesi Fen-Edebiyat Fakültesi Sanat Tarihi Bölümü – Niğde

Buyuk Mecidiye Mosque, commonly known as the Ortaköy Mosque, was built by Sultan Abdülmecid, and opened for
worship in 1854. It is a coastal mosque built during the years when the Ottoman administration moved to Bosphorus. The
building represents Late Ottoman architecture with its plan scheme and ornamental features. The architect of the mosque
is referred to Nigogos Balyan in many sources, but there are opposite opinions. In this article, the facade formation of
Buyuk Mecidiye Mosque will be examined in the context of architectural and ornamental elements. Consequently, the
formal analysis for facades of the Buyuk Mecidiye Mosque will be made in a selective approach of westernized period
European styles and a new interpretation were used.

One of the results of the archaeological survey carried
out in Main Market Square (Rynek Główny) in Kraków
was the discovery of historical ornaments, including a vast
number of medieval rings. The oldest artefacts in this category
come from the burial sites basically dating back to
the 11th century, while the latest fi nds in the analyzed collection are dated to the 15th century. Th e authors present
the selected items and discuss certain technicalities of the
production of medieval ornaments. Many of the discovered
objects underwent specialized tests in the area of metal science, aimed at accurate determination of the alloys used to
produce them etc. Apart from the rather uncommon silver
ornaments, the discovered collection includes objects made
of copper and tin, or, strictly speaking, the alloys of the
above. Th e specialized tests confi rmed great popularity of
such alloys for the production of ornaments in the Middle
Ages. Another issue of interest for the authors is the medieval
production of copperware.

The paper is devoted to the interpretation of the Tripolye-Cucuteni culture pottery designs. In the last decades the abstract-geometric ornamental motifs were often treated on the basis of subjective associations as images of a «moon-faced Goddess», «World egg», «shells», etc. Various ethnographic analogies, usually rather distant from the material under study, were used to reconstruct the meaning of the designs.
Within the framework of the «structural-semiotic approach» the ornament is analyzed as a «sign system» or «proto-writing», where each element or motif is supposed to bear a particular meaning. However, the careful analysis of the dynamics inherent
in the development of ornamental motifs shows, that such interpretations lack solid grounds. Most signs prove to be elements of «technical design» (marking-out). The construction of ornaments mostly proceeds by way of dividing ornamental fields, not by creating sequemnces of signs like it is done in texts. What was meaningful was the ornament taken as such, as an integrated whole, and not its elements. Ethnographic evidence shows, that even the interpretation of identical ornamental figures may vary considerably within the same society. This is confirmed by the author’s observations on the variation of the Tripolye designs. They seem to have no unambiguous «reading». The main directions of future research lie in the realm of paleoethnological and paleoculturological studies, where ornamental designs are regarded as specific markers, reflecting reflecting changes in ethnic composition and social structure of past societies, and bearing information about contacts between representatives of different groups

The method of symmetrical analysis (Fig. 1) is first applied to studies of ornamental compositions on the pottery of the Tripolye culture. For the investigations, materials from sites of the late period — settlements of Popudnya, Shipintsy, Kanev group (stage CI), as well as the Vykhvatintsy burial ground (stage СII) (Fig. 2), were used. Variants of the compositions of the borders (linear designs) were analysed, as well as the rosettes (compositions in a circle) (Fig. 3; 4). The border designs were considered separately through their basic structure and the resulting composition, taking in account additional elements (Fig. 5). It has been established that, in the linear compositions, everywhere schemes with vertical and horizontal mirror symmetry predominate, as well as those with the rotation of the motif in 180° — rotation symmetry. Considerably rarer are compositions with a sliding symmetry which in the majority of cases are disturbed by foreign elements. In complexes of stage CI, the percent ration of the types of symmetry of borders is approximately the same. In the border schemes of the final of the late Tripolye СII from Vykhvatintsy, there is an increased number of compositions without a symmetry or with a vertical reflection of the motif. In the rosette designs from Popudnya, Shipintsy and Kanev group of stage СI, cyclic motifs with their rotation around the central point predominate. In Vykhvatintsy, exclusively dihedral schemes are present where the rotational and mirror symmetries are combined. The investigations have shown that the types of symmetry in the ornamentation of the Tripolye pottery changed with the cardinal changes in the culture at the final stage of its development. Symmetrical analysis can be an important addition in the interdisciplinary studies of ceramic complexes and helping not only to reveal the cultural interrelations but also to trace the changes in the composition of the population and social structures at different chronological stages.