Glass has been a source of inspiration across the years. Stained glass is such an important part of art history, indeed, being adapted over the time. Going from small objects to big facilities, stained glass is such a great way to provide style as any scene can be depicted on it, this is the main reason why it is mostly used in churches and temples. Today we’ll be talking a bit about stained glass and how it might be used in modern decorations.
What is stained glass, and where does it come from?
Stained glass is a kind of glass that has been coloured using metallic oxides when it’s in a molten state, in order to give specific tones to it. It is mainly used in churches and cathedrals as almost every scene can be depicted on them.
It dates back to egypt and mesopotamia, they say that this technique first started to be used around the year 300 BF since they have found several objects from that time. Then it was considered a luxury and not a decorative object.
Several experts have said that stained glass became popular once christians were allowed to freely practice their religion, and it became a decorative object at churches and cathedrals.
Stained glass is well known by dispensing with figurative illustrations, reducing the use of grisailles and enamels, focusing more on the properties and qualities of glass, such as printed textures and colors, with the aim of obtaining the maximum amount of light on the stained glass.
Types of stained glass
There are several classes of stained glass, let’s take a look at some of them!
Romantic
On the first hand, this type has a wide range of colors with bright tones that follow the laws of superficial fit. On the other hand, its motifs are geometric and based on the bible stories.
Gothic
Gothic stained glass has a background without colors or in grayscales. They are focused on showing certain topics to mankind, and some of them may include golden color.
Contemporary stained glass
This one is very common nowadays. They are painted by craftsmen who use some sort of different special paints to give them different tonalities.
Stained glass - Modern applications
Back in the day, it looked like stained glass was only used on big buildings or religious places like churches and cathedrals. But now it’s a completely different situation, because it’s not only used on churches and big buildings anymore. Nowadays, stained glass is commonly used at modern places like commercial buildings.
Over the years and the innovation of technologies, glass art has been modified by new trends in architecture that suggest lead-free creations, with modern designs and completely attached to the demands in decoration.
In current stained glass windows there are no marked and notorious divisions between pieces, instead each piece is joined through invisible structures, hidden between the stained glass and diminished with the help of design, leaving aside the implementation of lead and kitsch for its union, these being old-fashioned and in bad taste in such an important artistic object, such as a glass work.
