The art of the books

THE BOOK OF HOURS

The book was very popular in Medieval Ages because of its content. It is illuminated manuscript. Especially in the Gothic period people needed easier books and they came up with Book of Hours which were far less complex than the breviarys they used. The common charasteristic of the Book of Hours is that they start with a calender which marks thespecial days of christianity. Then cames the part that is taken from the four gospels and continues with specific parts endind with various prayers. As it can seen from the name ‘hours’ it is based on a system and it is for people to understand clearly and systematicly.

It is said that majority of the books were made for woman and usually given to them as a wedding gift from the husband. It definitely becomes the family property and it goes through out the years. The illumination amount in the book decided its price. At the time it was not easy to have a book of hours; you had to be very very rich or it had to be given from your family.Hence it was impossible to have any book since 15th century when book became more affordable but the book of hours were very precious. Today its kept in a place dark so that light won’t get to the papers and it’s almost impossible to see them.

As we can see the drawings and the format of the pages are extremely complex and very new. We must look at them reminding us that they are hand made and each of the pages looks like a painting by itself. It is too much for a book of religion and visually very attractive. As the time goes the page structure evaluates but these book are very important step in the evaluation process for my sake.

References:

http://www.bookofhours.org/

http://justonemore.info/2009/11/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_hours

http://www.medievalist.net/hourstxt/hrsintro.htm

Alphabet..

Chinese Alphabet


Since I live in Turkey we use Latin alphabet which is very common through out the world. The chinese alphabet is very different for me. There are shapes and it’s a form of art from my opinion. I wanted to know more about this alphabet since Latin is used worldwide and easier, why do they still use their alphabet?

Chinese alphabet is the longest used alphabet in the world and it has 47,035 characters in it. According to other common alphabets its a lot more characters used. In order to be literate you have to learn three thousand to four thousand characters from those fifty thousand characters; which is still unbelievably many to learn. For just reading the newspapers you need to know at least 3000 characters. Chinese ‘letters’ are representing an idea, a concept or an object where in other alphabets letters by themselves do not mean anything; you have to put together to form a word that means something. Here’s just the very simplified characters of the alphabet;

Actually the earliest know chinese script is the Oracle Bone Scrip and when people started researching it they assumed that every letter symbolized a pictogram. These were found in 1899. Yet theres no clue of how or who have founded this alphabet. There are some theories and myths about the origin but the actual truth is not know.

Also in Chinese alphabet there’s no such things as capital letters. It’s just one size of writing. As I understand from their alphabet they don’t need the increasation of letters to emphasize a word or let the people understand a new sentence is starting; they have so many characters that represent many things and maybe thats why they don’t need capitals.


 There are enormous amount of characters as I said, that made me curious about the computers they use. Actually most of the Western people using Chinese, Korean and Japnese alphabet prefer writing in tablets or pads since it’s easier to write. Other than that they commonly use a specific type of keyboard among many options to choose;

Zen Garden Japan kyoto

I saw a lot of things in these slides about Japan and Chinese culture however the Zen Gardens take my attention very much because they are really interesting and beautiful.

Zen gardens are Japanese rocky gardens. It includes sand ,gravel  ,rock and sometimes grass. According to a common belief it used by Japanese Zen priests to make meditation.

Some examples of Zen Gardens in Japan...

ikebana

 

Flowers are cut not to death...


In western cultures to cut flower means to grow them in a pot. However in Japan cultures it is much more different. Ikebana means to make the flower live. There are lots of schools to live the flowers named ikebana, Sogetsu and Ohara

In 1930's the interest to Ikebana increased a lot and it become very common.

Ideograms

                                                     Some of them are a little bit complex...

some of them are more familier...

                                         

Some become part of our lifes...

some is the fountain of our lives...

Ideogram is a concept which is understood in every language. It is usually mixed with pictogram, however pictogram is used to express concrete things. Ideogram is used to express abstract things. Forexample =) I hope you can smile when you see that sign=) Because smiling is more important than ideograms and pictograms =)

Rocks and caves

People think that the students learn visual communication in the class to learn the art. Actually visual communication is a necessity not the result. Visual communication has begun like 40 000 years ago. Before people learn how to read and write and maybe before people started to talk the same language they started to draw something in the caves and the rocks. The first tool of the communication is the visual communication. And that style of communication never changed and always understood by the people in the earth because it is an universal language and going to last forever. Because there was no paper in the earth the people who lived 40 000 years ago, were drawing in the caves and in the rocks.

This is one of the most amazing example of rock art. This is made in ice age and it has protected itself until now. Rock art seems in the Sahara and in South Africa, Australia, and the America. It is one of the most beautiful thing in the human history, it shows human feelings very well.

This is another example of the rock art. The painting on this is made because of the religious reasons. The paintings on it are totally abstract. However this painting is made less then 1000 years ago so this painting is newer than the upper one.

This is an example of budhist rock art. However as we understand from the colors of this rock painting this is much more newer than the upper paintings and the colors are more alive