Customer Reviews

Arabesques. Decorative Art in Morocco

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I attended a lecture by Jean-Marc at Microsoft's MOSAIC (Microsymposium on Analysis and Synthesis of Intuitively Conceived Geometrical Art). Castera's work is unique and brilliant. The book is worth it for the hundreds, maybe thousands of giant color plates of Morroccan mosaics alone, and Castera's exposition of the artistic technique and culture of North Africa is excellent.

The core of his work, though, is the mathematical analysis of mosque mosaics, and his rigorous but accessible explanation of tiling rules is fantastic. He goes all the way from how to construct a Solomon's Seal on graph paper to multi-dimensional group theory and back again. I can't say enough good things about Castera's work and this book.

Consider it an investment in a lifetime fascination.

I truly adore this book. It comes in a hard case and beautifully bound edition. Author has dones extensive research on the structural and composition of these complicated and intricated Islamic patterns, providing existing examples and computer generated illustrations. You better have a fair grasp of math and geometry if you want to create these images. It is an expensive book but worthy of its price for the scholarly work. Probably the only improvement one can think of adding to this publication is a CD insert with the software that can produce the complex design and forms.

Fantastic book, but Amazon is incapable of packing a heavy book properly at this time. They use a few airbags in a large box and the book slides around and gets badly dented by the time it arrives. They did this again when I ordered a replacement.

I admit I bought the book for its copious, amazing pictures and beautiful presentation. But the text is phenomenal, and the illustrations help foster a tangible understanding of how this work is created. This is everything you want a book to do- enlighten and inspire!

I bought this book, as another reviewer said "just for the pictures". When you study this book day after day with a mind on fire with creativity you will realize that there is nothing wrong with that. The plates are truly awesome and filled with many hundreds of the most beautiful mosaics, calligraphy and carvings. This not just a "picture book"; the author has carefully laid out the geometry behind it to be intelligible with many, many drawings and some 3D computer compositions. I am now studying this brilliant world of art with the hope of creating in these techniques myself.