Maiolica - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Maiolica is Italian tin-glazed pottery

Tin-glazed pottery

Tin-glazed pottery is a majolica pottery covered in glaze containing tin oxide which is white, shiny and opaque. The pottery body is usually made of red or buff colored earthenware and the white glaze was often used to imitate Chinese porcelain...

dating from the Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

. It is decorated in bright colours on a white background, frequently depicting historical and legendary scenes.

Name

The name is thought to come from the medieval Italian word for Majorca, an island on the route for ships bringing Hispano-Moresque wares from Valencia to Italy. Moorish potters from Majorca are reputed to have worked in Sicily and it has been suggested that their wares reached the Italian mainland from Caltagirone

Caltagirone

Caltagirone is a town and comune in the province of Catania, on the island of Sicily, about 70 km southwest of Catania. It is bounded by the comuni of Acate, Gela, Grammichele, Licodia Eubea, Mazzarino, Mazzarrone, Mineo, Mirabella Imbaccari, Niscemi, Piazza Armerina, San Michele di...

An alternative explanation of the name is that it comes from the Spanish term obra de Malaga
Málaga
Málaga is a city and a municipality in the Autonomous Community of Andalusia, Spain. With a population of 568,507 in 2010, it is the second most populous city of Andalusia and the sixth largest in Spain. This is the southernmost large city in Europe...

, denoting “[imported] wares from Malaga”. or obra de mélequa, the Spanish name for luster.

In the 15th century, the term maiolica referred solely to lusterware

Lusterware

Lusterware or Lustreware is a type of pottery or porcelain with a metallic glaze that gives the effect of iridescence, produced by metallic oxides in an overglaze finish, which is given a second firing at a lower temperature in a "muffle kiln", reduction kiln, which excludes oxygen.The first use...

, including both Italian-made and Spanish imports, and tin-glaze wares were known as bianchi (white ware). Eventually the term came to be used when describing ceramics made in Italy, lustered or not, of tin-glazed earthenware. With the Spanish conquest of Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

, tin-glazed maiolica wares came to be produced in the Valley of Mexico as early as 1540, at first in imitation of tin-glazed pottery imported from Seville

Seville

Seville is the artistic, historic, cultural, and financial capital of southern Spain. It is the capital of the autonomous community of Andalusia and of the province of Seville. It is situated on the plain of the River Guadalquivir, with an average elevation of above sea level...

. Mexican maiolica is known famously as 'Talavera

Talavera (pottery)

Talavera pottery of Puebla, Mexico is a type of majolica pottery, which is distinguished by a milky-white glaze. Authentic Talavera pottery only comes from the city of Puebla and the nearby communities of Atlixco, Cholula, and Tecali, because of the quality of the natural clay found there and the...

Tin-glazed earthenware

Tin glazing creates a brilliant white, opaque surface for painting. The colours are applied as metallic oxides or as fritted

Frit

Frit is a ceramic composition that has been fused in a special fusing oven, quenched to form a glass, and granulated. Frits form an important part of the batches used in compounding enamels and ceramic glazes; the purpose of this pre-fusion is to render any soluble and/or toxic components insoluble...

underglazes to the unfired glaze, which absorbs pigment like fresco, making errors impossible to fix, but preserving the brilliant colors. Sometimes the surface is covered with a second glaze (called coperta by the Italians) that lends greater shine and brilliance to the wares. In the case of lustred wares, a further firing at a lower temperature is required. Kilns required wood (which contributed to deforestation even of the unplantable hillsides at ever higher altitudes) as well as suitable clay. Glaze was made from sand, wine lees

Lees (fermentation)

Lees refers to deposits of dead yeast or residual yeast and other particles that precipitate, or are carried by the action of "fining", to the bottom of a vat of wine after fermentation and ageing. The yeast deposits in beer brewing are known as trub...

, lead compounds and tin compounds.

Analysis of many samples of Italian majolica pottery from the Middle Ages has indicated that tin was not always a component of the majolica glazes, whose chemical composition was not constant

The fifteenth-century wares that initiated maiolica as an art form were the product of an evolution in which medieval lead-glazed wares were improved by the addition of tin oxides under the influence of Islamic wares imported through Sicily. Such archaic wares are sometimes called "proto-maiolica". During the later fourteenth century, the limited palette of colours was expanded from the traditional manganese

Manganese

Manganese is a chemical element, designated by the symbol Mn. It has the atomic number 25. It is found as a free element in nature , and in many minerals...

purple and copper

Copper

Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29. It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. Pure copper is soft and malleable; an exposed surface has a reddish-orange tarnish...

green to include cobalt

Cobalt

Cobalt is a chemical element with symbol Co and atomic number 27. It is found naturally only in chemically combined form. The free element, produced by reductive smelting, is a hard, lustrous, silver-gray metal....

blue, antimony

Antimony

Antimony is a toxic chemical element with the symbol Sb and an atomic number of 51. A lustrous grey metalloid, it is found in nature mainly as the sulfide mineral stibnite...

yellow and iron-oxide

Iron oxide

Iron oxides are chemical compounds composed of iron and oxygen. All together, there are sixteen known iron oxides and oxyhydroxides.Iron oxides and oxide-hydroxides are widespread in nature, play an important role in many geological and biological processes, and are widely utilized by humans, e.g.,...

orange. Sgraffito
Sgraffito
Sgraffito is a technique either of wall decor, produced by applying layers of plaster tinted in contrasting colors to a moistened surface, or in ceramics, by applying to an unfired ceramic body two successive layers of contrasting slip, and then in either case scratching so as to produce an...

wares were also produced, in which the white tin-oxide glaze was scratched through to produce a design from the revealed body of the ware. Scrap sgraffito ware excavated from kilns in Bacchereto, Montelupo

Montelupo Fiorentino

Montelupo Fiorentino is a comune in the Province of Florence in the Italian region Tuscany, located about 20 km southwest of Florence...

and Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

show that such wares were produced more widely than at Perugia

Perugia

Perugia is the capital city of the region of Umbria in central Italy, near the River Tiber, and the capital of the province of Perugia. The city is located about north of Rome. It covers a high hilltop and part of the valleys around the area....

and Città di Castello

Città di Castello

Città di Castello is a city and comune in the province of Perugia, in the northern part of the Umbria region of Italy. It is situated on a slope of the Apennines, on the flood plain of the river Tiber. The city is north of Perugia and south of Cesena on the S3bis. It is connected to the A1...

, the places to which they have been traditionally attributed.

History of production

Refined production of tin-glazed earthenwares made for more than local needs was concentrated in central Italy from the later thirteenth century, especially in the contada of Florence

Florence

. The medium was also adopted by the Della Robbia

Della Robbia

Della Robbia may refer to:*Luca della Robbia , Italian sculptor*Andrea della Robbia , Italian sculptor, nephew of Luca*Giovanni della Robbia , son of Andrea*Girolamo della Robbia , son of Andrea...

family of Florentine sculptors. The city itself declined in importance in the second half of the fifteenth century, perhaps because of local deforestation

Deforestation

Deforestation is the removal of a forest or stand of trees where the land is thereafter converted to a nonforest use. Examples of deforestation include conversion of forestland to farms, ranches, or urban use....

, while the production scattered among small communes and, after mid-fifteenth century, at Faenza

Faenza

Faenza is an Italian city and comune, in the province of Ravenna, Emilia-Romagna, situated 50 km southeast of Bologna.Faenza is noted for its manufacture of majolica ware glazed earthenware pottery, known from the name of the town as "faience"....

. Significantly, in a contract of 1490 twenty-three master-potters of Montelupo

Montelupo

Montelupo can refer to:*Montelupo Albese, Province of Cuneo, Piedmont, Italy*Montelupo Fiorentino, Province of Florence, Tuscany, Italy*Raffaello da Montelupo - Italian sculptor*Baccio da Montelupo - Italian painter...

agreed to sell the year's production to Francesco Antinori of Florence; Montelupo provided the experienced potters who were set up in 1495 at the Villa Medicea di Cafaggiolo‎ by its Medici

Medici

The House of Medici or Famiglia de' Medici was a political dynasty, banking family and later royal house that first began to gather prominence under Cosimo de' Medici in the Republic of Florence during the late 14th century. The family originated in the Mugello region of the Tuscan countryside,...

owners. Florentine wares spurred characteristic productions in the fifteenth century at Arezzo

Arezzo

Arezzo is a city and comune in Central Italy, capital of the province of the same name, located in Tuscany. Arezzo is about 80 km southeast of Florence, at an elevation of 296 m above sea level. In 2011 the population was about 100,000....

and Siena

Siena

Siena is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.The historic centre of Siena has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site. It is one of the nation's most visited tourist attractions, with over 163,000 international arrivals in 2008...

.

In the fifteenth century Italian maiolica reached an astonishing degree of perfection. In Romagna, Faenza

Faenza

, which gave its name to faience

Faience

Faience or faïence is the conventional name in English for fine tin-glazed pottery on a delicate pale buff earthenware body, originally associated with Faenza in northern Italy. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip...

, produced fine maiolica from the early fifteenth century; it was the only fair-sized city in which the ceramic industry became a major economic component. Bologna

Bologna

Bologna is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna, in the Po Valley of Northern Italy. The city lies between the Po River and the Apennine Mountains, more specifically, between the Reno River and the Savena River. Bologna is a lively and cosmopolitan Italian college city, with spectacular history,...

produced lead-glazed wares for export. Orvieto

Orvieto

Orvieto is a city and comune in Province of Terni, southwestern Umbria, Italy situated on the flat summit of a large butte of volcanic tuff...

and Deruta

Deruta

Deruta is a hill town and comune in the Province of Perugia in the Umbria region of central Italy. Long known as a center of refined maiolica manufacture, Deruta remains known for its ceramics, which are exported worldwide.-History:...

both produced maioliche in the fifteenth century. In the sixteenth century, maiolica production was established at Castel Durante, Urbino

Urbino

Urbino is a walled city in the Marche region of Italy, south-west of Pesaro, a World Heritage Site notable for a remarkable historical legacy of independent Renaissance culture, especially under the patronage of Federico da Montefeltro, duke of Urbino from 1444 to 1482...

, Gubbio

Gubbio

Gubbio is a town and comune in the far northeastern part of the Italian province of Perugia . It is located on the lowest slope of Mt. Ingino, a small mountain of the Apennines. See also Mount Ingino Christmas Tree.-History:...

and Pesaro

Pesaro

Pesaro is a town and comune in the Italian region of the Marche, capital of the Pesaro e Urbino province, on the Adriatic. According to the 2007 census, its population was 92,206....

. The early sixteenth century saw the development of istoriato wares on which historical and legendary scenes were painted in great detail. The State Museum of Medieval and Modern Art in Arezzo

Arezzo

claims to have the largest collection of istoriato wares in Italy. Istoriato wares are also well represented in the British Museum

British Museum

The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

, London.

Some maiolica was produced as far north as Padua

Padua

Padua is a city and comune in the Veneto, northern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Padua and the economic and communications hub of the area. Padua's population is 212,500 . The city is sometimes included, with Venice and Treviso, in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area, having...

, Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

and Turin

Turin

Turin is a city and major business and cultural centre in northern Italy, capital of the Piedmont region, located mainly on the left bank of the Po River and surrounded by the Alpine arch. The population of the city proper is 909,193 while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat...

and as far south as Palermo

Palermo

Palermo is a city in Southern Italy, the capital of both the autonomous region of Sicily and the Province of Palermo. The city is noted for its history, culture, architecture and gastronomy, playing an important role throughout much of its existence; it is over 2,700 years old...

and Caltagirone

Caltagirone

in Sicily and Laterza in Apulia. In the seventeenth century Savona

Savona

Savona is a seaport and comune in the northern Italian region of Liguria, capital of the Province of Savona, in the Riviera di Ponente on the Mediterranean Sea....

began to be a prominent place of manufacture.

The variety of styles that arose in the sixteenth century all but defies classification. Italian cities encouraged the start of a new pottery industry by offering tax relief, citizenship, monopoly rights and protection from outside imports.

An important mid-sixteenth century document for the techniques of maiolica painting is the treatise of Cipriano Piccolpasso

Cipriano Piccolpasso

Cipriano di Michele Piccolpasso was a member of an Italian patrician family of Bologna that had been settled since the mid-fifteenth century in Castel Durante, which was an important center for the manufacture of maiolica...

, not a professional potter himself. Individual sixteenth-century masters like Nicola da Urbino

Nicola da Urbino

Nicola da Urbino formerly confused with Nicola Pellipario has traditionally been designated as the Italian ceramicist from Castel Durante in Marche who introduced into painted maiolica the new istoriato style, in which the whole surface of a plate or charger is devoted to a single representational...

, Francesco Xanto Avelli

Francesco Xanto Avelli

thumb|200px|Francesco Xanto Avelli, "Broad-rimmed bowl with Neptune raping Theophane; arms of Pucci with an 'ombrellino'", 1532Francesco Xanto Avelli was an Italian ceramicist. He is best known for his painted maiolica works....

, Guido Durantino and Orazio Fontana of Urbino, Mastro Giorgio of Gubbio and Maestro Domenigo of Venice all deserve individual treatment. Gubbio lustre used colours such as greenish yellow, strawberry pink and a ruby red.
The tradition of maiolica died away in the eighteenth century, under competition from inexpensive porcelains and white earthenware.

Some of the principal centers of production (e.g. Deruta

Deruta

and Montelupo

Montelupo

) still produce maiolica, which is sold world wide. Modern maiolica looks different from old maiolica because its glaze is usually opacified with the cheaper zircon

Zircon

Zircon is a mineral belonging to the group of nesosilicates. Its chemical name is zirconium silicate and its corresponding chemical formula is ZrSiO4. A common empirical formula showing some of the range of substitution in zircon is 1–x4x–y...

rather than tin, though there are potteries that specialise in making authentic-looking Renaissance-style pieces with genuine tin-glaze.

"By a convenient extension and limitation the name may be applied to all tin-glazed ware, of whatever nationality, made in the Italian tradition ... the name faïence

Faience

(or the synonymous English 'delftware') being reserved for the later wares of the 17th Century onwards, either in original styles (as in the case of the French) or, more frequently, in the Dutch-Chinese (Delft) tradition." The term "maiolica" is sometimes applied to modern tin-glazed ware made by studio potters (as in Osterman's book, see below).

The English word, majolica, is also used for Victorian majolica

Victorian majolica

Victorian Majolica is earthenware pottery made in 19th century Britain, Europe and the USA with molded surfaces and colorful clear lead glazes.-History:...

, a different type of pottery with clear, coloured glazes.

External links

Maiolica dish, From Deruta, Umbria, Italy, around AD 1490-1525, British Museum The maiolica collection includes Italian Renaissance and Moorish pieces
Italian maiolica
Metropolitan Museum of Art

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.