The AlhambraTiling Project is an enterprise in Community art and education – aimed mainly at primary schools in South London, but with layers of interest for people of all ages and abilities, progressing from the simplest to the most sophisticated level.

Britain is experiencing a dramatic decline in the teaching of traditional pottery skills; skills that are important in the development of hand/eye co-ordination among children, self esteem for young people and versatility among adults.  We aim to use tile making as a gateway back to some of these neglected skills.

As its name implies, the project is inspired by the intricate mathematical tile patterns that adorn the walls of the Alhambra Palace, a famous monument of ancient Spain.

There are only seventeen ways in which two-dimensional space can be divided to make regular patterns , or ‘fields’, and versions of all of these can be found in the Alhambra.  As such, they can provide an excellent introduction to all the principles of Symmetry.

The patterns are also interesting in terms of the theory of art and the practice of craft.  A tile is not a picture in a book or on a screen; it is a tangible tactile thing, formed by hand from earth, and wrought by fire until it turns to stone.  The durability of ceramic art enables us to communicate with our ancestors, and to leave messages for future generations. Tiles can be challenging things to make but crafting anything from clay brings its reward, in the form of a permanent product, and in the sense of accomplishment that comes from making something of your own.  Tile making can also be fun.

This can also be a  communal endeavour. If one hundred people each make ten tiles, then suddenly a thousand tiles have sprung to life – units that can be fitted together like jigsaw pieces so that they form an integrated whole.

These carefully framed and grouted panels of tiles, in turn can later be assembled into even larger displays – public exhibitions of   vibrant and high quality work, of which a thousand people may be proud, and which can be of genuine interest and appeal to a similar number of visitors

This positive interaction, among different groups of people, reflects the interaction of the tiles as groups of shapes – harmony arising from diversity – a potent symbol of community cohesion as well as an example of it.  The tile makers of the old Alhambra Palace knew this too; their work belongs to the Islamic tradition of sacred geometry, which is to do with balance and proportion among all parts, on every scale from zero to infinity.

“Truth, beauty, art, adventure, peace; such are the five great aspirations of the human spirit”.  Alfred North Whitehead,  Adventures In Ideas.

We believe that Art, the third of these, can and should be the vehicle of all the other four.

“When you put your hands in the clay, it’s like you’ve just plugged yourself into the national grid of spituality”.  Rex Ainley, Mental  Health Service User and one of the founders of the Alhambra Tiling Project.

An unusual way of putting it, perhaps, but it’s easy to see what he means.