Mosaic
Horses
Maryanna Rudecki
Inspiration for artwork can be
found in many places. Piazza
Armerina in Sicily, Italy, is home
to the early fourth-century mosaics in the Roman Villa
of Casale. It is thought that this villa
was the imperial hunting place of
Maximianus
Herculius,
co-emperor of
Rome from 286
to 305 AD
The floors
of the sixty-three rooms of
the villa are decorated with some of
the finest surviving mosaics from
Roman antiquity, depicting hunting,
mythological and domestic scenes,
and exotic landscapes. I was lucky to
view such remarkable mosaics while
visiting family in Sicily. Converting
the mosaic idea for use with equine
subject matter came about as a project idea for our annual Houston Livestock and Rodeo Art Show.
1" ( 2. 5 cm) paintbrushes and painted
on large pieces of poster or railroad
board using an up and down stippling
motion. We used reds, pinks, oranges,
blues, purples, yellows, and black-brown combinations, but metallic
silver, gold, and bronze can also be
added.
Converting the mosaic idea
In the second
for use with equine subject
class, students
matter came about as a project
sketched horse’s
heads on 12
idea for our annual Houston
x 18" ( 30 x 45
Livestock and Rodeo Art Show.
cm) construc-
tion paper (not
black) using horse figurines as mod-
els. As students worked, I read aloud
the book Leonardo’s Horse by Jean
Fritz to help set the mood.
Creating a Background
In the first class, students viewed my
PowerPoint presentation of mosaics
from the Villa Romana del Casale
and reviewed complementary and
analogous colors. They double loaded
Assembling the Mosaic
In the third class, students cut black or
brown painted railroad board into thin
strips and then into smaller pieces.
They began to fill in the “lines” on
their drawings with these pieces. Eyes
and nostrils were added using paint
or construction paper. Students next
filled in the horse’s face using a choice
of warm colors. I encouraged them
to be sure each piece of mosaic had a
small margin of the background construction paper left around it to give
the appearance of grout.
Students next cut out the horse’s
heads, leaving a small margin of construction paper attached, and glued
the head to a new piece of 12 x 18"
construction paper. They chose a
color that would contrast with their
horse and complement their background color.
Students added manes to their
horses and filled in the background
using cool colors. The final step was
to brush gloss tempera varnish over
the finished work. Students presented
their work to their peers and discussed the thought and technical pro-
