Cisco have chosen to feature Gaudi and Jujol’s mosaic bench in Barcelona in their Human Network Campaign. It appears as the main image representing the “Unified Communications” strand, and is on whole-page adverts in the UK press at the moment. Always great to see, of course. It’s not the first time Gaudi and Jujol’s work has been used in eye-catching advertising, by any means. There was an ad for spirits on UK TV some years back, for example. I remember the mosaics (the chimney structures on the Palau Guell)  , but sadly not whether it was vodka or rum being plugged…

Hurrah! The latest edition of “Grout”, the newsletter of the British Association for Modern Mosaic is here. As ever, it’s superbly produced and full of quality photos of mosaics. There are illustrated reviews of exhibitions; an article about Oliver Budd’s work to preserve some of his father’s public mosaics; a feature on Newfoundland-based artist Terry Nicholls; and articles on Tunisian mosaics and a possible patron saint of mosaics. Need more? There’s part two of Gary Drostles’s guide to andamento, personal accounts of how people got started in mosaic and book reviews, and more… It’s sent free to members - find out how to join on the BAMM website.

The Telegraph has a report on new findings from study of the mathematics of medieval islamic tiling patterns. The work by Peter J. Lu and Paul J. Steinhardt was published in “Science” this week. They discovered that the creators of tile mosaics in ancient mosques and palaces had the ability to produce non-repeating patterns known as quasi-crystalline patterns.  In the western world, these were brought to to light by Sir Roger Penrose in 1973, with the discovery of so-called Penrose tilings.

Quasi-crystalline patterns can expand to tessellate  a surface (cover it without gaps) in all directions, infinitely but without repeating. Most tessellations are based on repeating patterns. The authors of the study highlighted the use of “girih” tiles - sets of shapes based on 5-point symmetry. These can be laid in regular patterns, but the arrangements chosen  were quasi-crystalline ones - showing an understanding of the maths required to generate this kind of tessellation.

With the eyes of the world on the controversial Temple Mount excavation at the Mugrabi Gate, The Telegraph reports that a Byzantine mosaic has been uncovered there. Much as if a rare bird had built a nest in the scaffolding, it seems that construction work on the contentious ramp walkway will be halted until the find can be assessed. If the fragment unearthed is part of a larger mosaic, it may need to be carefully extracted by archeologists.

Whether this will take any of the heat out of the situtaion remains to be seen. What can be seen is live video from 3 cameras overlooking the site…