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Renaissance Majolica
The renaissance period is surely the most representative for Deruta production.
This period is characterized by lustre ware and display plates production for celebrative use.
The plates are very rich in forms and decorations. The work is depicted with betrothal dance, religious motifs, historic figures and female profiles. This pattern is known “belle donne” ware. To idealize female images the plates are enriched by inscriptions into a cartouche, either with or without adjective or mottoes; the border is compartmentalized with imbrications or leaves interchange, thrown of thorns, flower volutes, and other patterns.
Other renaissance forms are love trophy, two-handled bowls and spouted jars.
The collection displays an important spouted jar with a moor’s head profile, dated 1501.
In some scholars opinion this work shows for the first time the emblematic pattern of the Grotesque style. The spouted jar shows an acronym, PAM or PAMQ, surmounted by a double cross under its handle. In the central part of the globular jar we can read a pharmaceutical inscription: SY° DESTICADOSO; the name is probably referred to the syrup preserved in it. In the British Museum are displayed other two spouted jars with the same morphological features.
In the fine selection of Renaissance room we find a new style, the so called “historiated-ware”, produced by Giacomo Mancini, called El Frate, who surely is the most important artist of this period.
Another important pattern of this period is surely the so called “petal back”. It’s characterized by a decoration with blue and orange petals applied to the back of plates; the scholar Bernard Rackham called the style with the name of “petal back”.
LUSTRE WARE
Lustre majolica is an important production for Deruta tradition documented at the beginning of the 16th century with San Sebastian plaque, dated 1501 and now housed in the Victoria and Albert Museum of London.
Probably its origin can be traced in Hispano-Moresque workshops and Islamic culture.
This particular kind of majolica derives from a process that gives a shine to the glazing with gold and red glints. To achieve this iridescent effect the glaze is coated with a varnish containing metal salts; then the object is fired for the third time in a oxygen-reduced atmosphere because of wood, brooms and other smoky substances.
  On the first floor (Deruta Museum) of the building are displayed some thematic productions.
The masterpiece of this section is surely the Pavement of the Church of San Francesco, dated 1524 and discovered in 1902. It is composed by a lot of tiles in the form of eight-pointed stars and crosses surrounded by rectangular elements.
The decoration shows a mix of sacred and profane motifs from greek culture.
The eight-pointed stars tiles are decorated, in fact, with a lot of mythological insert, female portraits, muses, sibyls, allegories, prophets and busts of emperors.
The tiles show a uniformity of style. These decorations are very closed to the representations of the cycle painted by Perugino in the “Cappella del Cambio” in Perugia as we can see on the tile with the benedictory Christ in Glory.
This wonderful example of ceramic Art is attributed to Nicola Francioli, called Co.
The Collection displayed other kinds of tiles with geometric and rectangular elements.
In the other room of Tiles Collection we can see other types of this production.
The showcases display a large set of tiles commissioned in 1543 by the Farnese Pope, Paul III, for his fortress, the Rocca Paolina in Perugia. The pavement of this stronghold in part came from Urbino, from Gubbio and finally from Deruta workshops.
International School of Ceramic Art "Romano Ranieri"
Via Tiberina
Sud 330 - 06053 Deruta (PG) Italia
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