Tag: contemporary mosaic

  • Mosaic Obelisk Garden Sculpture

    Mosaic Obelisk Garden Sculpture

    Lyn Richards has been making a series of mosaic obelisks for installation as garden sculptures, each with a completely different design. Like her Irises mosaic birdbath, Lyn’s garden obelisks are tightly executed.

  • Van Gogh’s Cat Mixed-Media Mosaic Sculpture

    Van Gogh’s Cat Mixed-Media Mosaic Sculpture

    Artist Peter Vogelaar has been at it again, and this time he has managed to surprise me. His recent mixed-media mosaic sculpture Van Gogh’s Cat has a plinth that steals the show in my opinion. The plinth on which the cat is standing is a mosaic-covered cylinder that seamlessly combines Van Gogh’s Starry Night and…

  • Fundamentals of Mosaic Composition

    Fundamentals of Mosaic Composition

    I recently completed a mosaic titled Woodpecker Forest, which shows a pileated woodpecker on the side of a pine tree in a forest carpeted with capensis flowers. I think this composition is a good teaching example because it demonstrates several fundamentals of visual art. There is strong value contrast (light-dark) contrast in both the figure…

  • Pileated Woodpecker Mosaic

    Pileated Woodpecker Mosaic

    My Pileated Woodpecker mosaic was made by improvising over a pattern. I created the pattern from a photo collage that I made in Photoshop.

  • Stained Glass Improvised Mosaic

    Stained Glass Improvised Mosaic

    I made a mosaic of a pileated woodpecker by improvising over a pattern. Below is a video of the process of laying up the mosaic on a temporary surface of sticky contact paper.

  • Classic Tattoo Design Mosaics

    Classic Tattoo Design Mosaics

    Artist Sheldon Stehman‘s tattoo-inspired work demonstrates the vitality of the mosaic medium and how surprisingly well it accommodates contemporary pop-culture designs and themes. Sheldon uses classic tattoo designs as models for his mosaic interpretations. I think that was an inspired decision.

  • Variations on a Theme: Insight Mosaics

    Variations on a Theme: Insight Mosaics

    Artist Natalija Moss rebuilds Honda Insight hybrid cars, and she also makes mosaics of them using stained glass. Here are a few Honda Insight mosaics she made years ago. Unfortunately, Natalija didn’t take definitive photographs of each them, and so the images in this article were all created from the group photo using Photoshop. Even…

  • Kingfisher Mosaic: Improvising over a Pattern

    Kingfisher Mosaic: Improvising over a Pattern

    I made a video that shows how to translate an image into mosaic by improvising loosely over a pattern. The pattern I used for this demonstration was the pattern I created quickly using Photoshop for a friend.

  • Secret Tip for Improving Your Mosaics

    Secret Tip for Improving Your Mosaics

    Mosaic tile is laid one tile at a time, and the process can be distracting artistically. The mind becomes focused on fitting small pieces together instead of seeing the image as a whole. Fortunately there are ways around this problem.

  • Grout Line as Design and Figurative Element

    Grout Line as Design and Figurative Element

    Natalija Moss’s latest Honda Insight mosaic is a great example of stained-glass mosaic where the grout line is used as a figurative element and as an element visual framing. Natalija is a self-taught artist and mosaicist just like me, and she also rebuilds Honda Insights by restoring interiors and rebuilding the battery system with newer…

  • QR-Code Mosaic Sign

    QR-Code Mosaic Sign

    I needed to make a QR-code sign for my yard to tell my neighbors about the native pollinator meadow seedlings I have for them this year. I’ve converted my lawn into a native pollinator meadow, with all sorts of amazing results in terms of butterflies and hummingbirds and native ecology, and I am trying to…

  • Monumental Mosaic Sculpture

    Monumental Mosaic Sculpture

    Artist Valerie Theberge recently installed an outdoor mosaic sculpture in Washington, DC, and like much of her work, the sculpture is monumental in scale. I recommend taking a look at Valerie’s website or Instagram, especially if you are planning a large mosaic mural or sculpture.