Mosaic

29Syrian craftsmen have excelled in this craft, which alot of palaces and the old Damascene houses prove their creativity. Some of them invented and excelled in his designs, especially in the decorative wooden crafts such as the East Halls inside and outside Syria and in international exhibitions. Syria has been awarded the Gold Medal of Paris ( 1967 ) and certificates of appreciation from several shows as Barcelona Exhibit (1968 m) and Kuwait Gallery ( 1968 – 1969 ).

The word “mosaic” is originally Greek, it means the gods of art and beauty and it is a branch of mosaics that arose with the beginning of the first millennium BC.

Of craftsmen excelled in this craft Jurji Gabriel Bitar, who made ​​the first cut made ​​to the Ottoman Sultan Abdul-Hamid. It was a living room that made him get a medal from the Sultan and a privilege to teach this craft. He also participated Vienna Exhibition in 1891 and in Paris, where he decorated the Church of St. Julian the poor, he also won in Egypt in 1904 the first prize of manufactures of wood and making a safe Pope Pius X.

A craft related products appeared at the last ten years based on the demand of the handmade mosaic, it is called the mosaic restoration. Some of the craftsmen had been competent in it; some of them had inherited the profession from their family, but due to their skills in mosaic restoration they just majored in restoring old mosaic pieces

  • Mosaic Industry:

The structure of any piece is made of local walnut then the mosaic sheets are processed by taking 28constant wooden rods with a square or triangle portion and median length of 25 cm, then its collected and cut into chips in various forms and pasted on the mosaic piece by natural glue.

Mosaic is composed of colored wood material that is obtained from almonds, walnuts, roses, lemon, olive and eucalyptus, apricot as well as cockle then it is grouped into forms and geometric patterns with each other to give a beautiful piece of mosaic.

It wasn’t just about small pieces; it also produced large pieces such as desks, bookcases and chairs. Now we can get a full sitting room made of mosaic where the red color is taken from rosewood and yellow color is taken from lemon trees.

As for the ornamentation used in the mosaic industry, there is an infinite variety of ornamentation that is inspired by the craftsman’s imagination derived from the geometric shapes such as triangle and multi-designate and a parallelogram which are placed in different types of wood.