Last updated Mosaic border of rinceaux and animals, from the Via Panisperna in Rome, late 2nd - early 1st century BC
In architecture and the decorative arts, a rinceau (plural rinceaux; from the French, derived from old French rain 'branch with foliage') is a decorative form consisting of a continuous wavy stemlike motif from which smaller leafy stems or groups of leaves branch out at more or less regular intervals. The English term scroll is more often used in English, especially when the pattern is regular, repeating along a narrow zone. In English "rinceau" tends to be used where the design spreads across a wider zone, in a similar style to an Islamicarabesque pattern.
The use of rinceaux is frequent in the friezes of Roman buildings, where it is generally found in a frieze, the middle element of an entablature, just below the cornice. It is also decorated in the jamb ornaments and capitals of Romanesque structures and in friezes and panels of buildings in the various Renaissance styles, where tiny animals or human heads also appear.[1]
The rinceau experienced a return to the simpler Classic style in the 17th century, and in the subsequent century it was applied more freely, without a strict repetition of identical forms.[2]
Gallery
Ancient Greek rinceau on a mosaic of a stag hunt, Pella, Greece, unknown architect or craftsman, 4th century BC
Baroque rinceaux on a commode, by André-Charles Boulle, c.1710–1720, walnut veneered with ebony, marquetry of engraved brass and tortoiseshell, and gilt-bronze mounts, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Rococo rinceaux in the Bibliothèque du Dauphin du Château de Versailles, Palace of Versailles, Versailles, France, unknown architect, early or mid-18th century
Mughal and European-influenced rinceaux of the Peacock Gate of the City Palace, Jaipur, India, unknown architect or painter, 1729-1732[12]
Baroque Revival rinceaux with putti on a ceiling in the apartments of the minister of state, currently known as the Napoleon III Apartments, Louvre Palace, unknown architect or sculptor, c.1860
Beaux Arts fresco with cartouches and foliage spirals on the upper part of the facade of Strada Occidentului no. 11, Bucharest, painter: C. Cora, architect: Cesare Fantoli, 1910[16]
Neo-Louis XVI style panel with rinceaux and an urn in the Nicolae T. Filitti/Nae Filitis House (Calea Dorobanților no. 18), Bucharest, by Ernest Doneaud, c.1910[17]
Romanian Revival rinceau in the Gheorghe Petrașcu House (Piața Romană no. 5), Bucharest, by Spiru Cegăneanu, 1912[18]
Notes
↑ Cf. J. Ward, Historic Ornament: Treatise on Decorative Art and Architectural Ornament, BiblioBazaar (2009), s.v. Rinceau.
↑ Cf. A. Speltz, The History of Ornament: Design in the Decorative Arts, Portland (1989), s.v.
↑ Oprea, Petre (1986). Itinerar Inedit prin Case Vechi din București (in Romanian). Editura Sport-Turism. p.59.
↑ Marinache, Oana (2015). Ernest Donaud - visul liniei (in Romanian). Editura Istoria Artei. p.79. ISBN978-606-94042-8-7.
↑ Mariana Celac, Octavian Carabela and Marius Marcu-Lapadat (2017). Bucharest Architecture - an annotated guide. Ordinul Arhitecților din România. p.80. ISBN978-973-0-23884-6.
Home Economics Archive: Tradition, Research, History (HEARTH) An e-book collection of over 1,000 books on home economics spanning 1850 to 1950, created by Cornell University's Mann Library. Includes several hundred e-books on decorative art and design, particularly that created within the home.
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"Study the remains – no matter how small – of the artistic production of the past and make them the source of a great art (...) do not miss any opportunity to use the artistic elements presented by the Romanian monuments left over from old times; but transform them, change them, develop them ..."
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