| Terra Cotta |
Terra cotta is a form of hard-baked pottery, widely used in the decorative arts, especially as an architectural material, either in its natural red-brown color, or painted, or with a baked glaze. Its prevalence as a medium of artistic expression since the earliest periods of history is indicated by statuettes and vases from predynastic Egypt, polychrome tiles from Assyria and Persia, vases and figures from various Central American pre-Columbian sites, and Chinese vases dating probably from 3000 B.C. Terra-cotta first gained importance as an architectural material in classical Greece, where, beginning about the 7th cent. B.C., temples and other structures were often enriched with roof tiles, metopes, acroteria, and various other modeled and painted ornamental features of terra cotta. Similar roof tiles and ornaments are found in Etruscan and Roman work. However, the golden age of terra cotta was the Renaissance; it was widely used in N Italy and in N Germany, which have a scarcity of good building stone. In modern times terra-cotta has been used in the Victorian Gothic Revival and has received widespread application in the United States as an exterior covering for the skeleton steel structure. It was used with consummate skill by Louis Sullivan for decorative string courses on many of his buildings. Modern sculptors who have made notable terra cotta works include Maillol, Despiau, Epstein, and Picasso. Terra cotta has often been molded into the forms of the classical and other styles, with textures closely simulating various kinds of stone. However, it has been most successfully used not imitatively but on its own merits as a lightweight, nonbearing material, perfectly adapted to the task of sheathing a steel frame. Hollow blocks or tile of rough terra-cotta are used extensively as a structural material for walls and partitions, for floor arches, and for fireproofing. In modern practice terra-cotta is manufactured from carefully selected clays, which combined with water and vitrifying ingredients, are put through a pug mill or other device to reduce the mass to homogeneity. In cakes of convenient size the clay passes to the molding room. Individual pieces are modeled by hand; in the case of repetitive pieces, the clay is pressed into plaster molds to form a shell. The molded pieces are finished by hand and then are ready for baking in a kiln or reverberatory furnace. |
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