The history of Sgraffito
By Parker Taylor
Sgraffito is an ancient style of art that today is most commonly use in pottery; but appears in numerus forms of art from all over the world. The true origin of sgraffito is not known, and is still debated between scholars today. one belief of when sgraffito came from is in the early 10th century, but is argued to go as far back as the 5th century. The term sgraffito is the Italian word for scratch, it adopted this name due to the process used to create this art. It also means “to write or to mark” coming from the root word “Calligraphy” this applies to the drawing of pictures or writing into the art as it is made.
The process of sgraffito in pottery is using two layers of clay, a base layer that …show more content…
In Italy was the main development where these renaissance styles started becoming the notorious sgraffito. One reason for the development of sgraffito in Italy was that they wanted a nice white surface to decorate with for plates, but there were no sturdy resources to use at the time that were white, so they used the trusty red clay as a base, then had a secondary layer of liquid white clay which would serve as the surface. This white clay was decorated by engraving a design into it and then voila, sgraffito was born. Because of sgraffito, many generic potters became recognized renaissance artists.
Because of the uproar in sgraffito many potters used the style for pottery for homes, and this style became regarded as art. Sgraffito was applied later to stained glass, murals, floors and more than just pots and plates. These styles were used as early as 1735 by German colonists in America. All styles of Sgraffito no matter where applied use the idea of layers, such as stained glass having one color on top and when engraved revealing clear glass on
By Parker Taylor
Sgraffito is an ancient style of art that today is most commonly use in pottery; but appears in numerus forms of art from all over the world. The true origin of sgraffito is not known, and is still debated between scholars today. one belief of when sgraffito came from is in the early 10th century, but is argued to go as far back as the 5th century. The term sgraffito is the Italian word for scratch, it adopted this name due to the process used to create this art. It also means “to write or to mark” coming from the root word “Calligraphy” this applies to the drawing of pictures or writing into the art as it is made.
The process of sgraffito in pottery is using two layers of clay, a base layer that …show more content…
In Italy was the main development where these renaissance styles started becoming the notorious sgraffito. One reason for the development of sgraffito in Italy was that they wanted a nice white surface to decorate with for plates, but there were no sturdy resources to use at the time that were white, so they used the trusty red clay as a base, then had a secondary layer of liquid white clay which would serve as the surface. This white clay was decorated by engraving a design into it and then voila, sgraffito was born. Because of sgraffito, many generic potters became recognized renaissance artists.
Because of the uproar in sgraffito many potters used the style for pottery for homes, and this style became regarded as art. Sgraffito was applied later to stained glass, murals, floors and more than just pots and plates. These styles were used as early as 1735 by German colonists in America. All styles of Sgraffito no matter where applied use the idea of layers, such as stained glass having one color on top and when engraved revealing clear glass on