The town of Deruta in the Renaissance

The ceramics table you may find at the entrance of the
Ceramics Museum of Deruta. 

An interesting article about the town of Deruta was written by Franco Cocchi some time ago for a local internet page.  He is one of the two ceramics experts we have in Deruta. The other expert is Giulio Busti. Cocchi describes very well how Deruta in the Renaissance was rich in furnaces, churches and banks. Derutese people liked the entrepreneurial risk,  the economy was very vivid and indeed towards the middle of the 1400s  the town of Deruta attracted  three Jewish banks with a population of one thousand people only: Jewish bankers could lend money with interests which was not allowed to the Christians. 

Pinturicchio, one of my favorite artists of the Renaissance.
The artist of the details. Visit the Cathedral of Siena to see
one of his masterpieces: Libreria Piccolomini. 

Deruta was the home of merchants, artists and powerful people, starting from the Baglioni family from Perugia who owned the castle of Deruta, Caterina Sforza and Cesare Borgia, artists like Pinturicchio, Perugino and other artists of their circle. 

A detail of the table above: Perugino as an major
inspiring artist for Deruta. He was born in Città della Pieve (PG). 

Ceramicists took part to the political and civilian life of the town, for them education and science were in high consideration and they had a strong personality and could take important decisions for the benefit of Deruta.




Link to the original article in Italian by Franco Cocchi

The Cama Deruta scrolling: a detail turned into an art

Traditional patterns: Details make the difference 

Originally the scrolling on the Renaissance patterns from Deruta was a means to conceal the defects of the painting.

In the original patterns in museums the scrollings ("riccetti" in Italian) were very few.

At Cama these negligible details have been turned into an art, giving  the patterns an extreme consistency and keeping them adherent to the surface of the glaze.

Patterns are like a handwriting  and at Cama this writing is very refined and comparable to a handwriting in the italic style at its best.

Indeed italic was one of the predominant handwriting styles of the Italian Renaissance. This is the reason why the Cama patterns are considered as calligraphic where calligraphy is the art of beautiful handwriting.

One of the latest discoveries is that the writing by hand in italic, with the letters linked one to another, reproduces the flow of the thinking and it is an opportunity for artistic self-expression.

This is the comparison that explains at the best what we may read through the lines of  the traditional Cama patterns and make them so exclusive because of their consistency.

Source credit: La Stampa, Beautiful writing makes you smart, Time Magazine, Reforming with zigs zags.