::Romanian Traditional Handcrafts::

Ceramic objects are still used in rituals that mark important events such as birth, marriage, baptism, funerals, and funeral feasts. In the southern part of the country, families with a daughter of marriage-age display a plate in the window, with the top facing the street. When the young woman becomes engaged, her family announces her change in status by turning the plate to face away from the street. Before a wedding, young men go from door to door. Placed on tables or walls, traditional plates, bowls, or plaques decorate to this day traditional and even modern Romanian homes. Some items, such as traditional wedding pitchers with trays and cups, are still being used, in this case to serve wine and plum brandy. The purpose of Romanian ceramics has changed with the pace of time. Attentive to the urban and individual taste, it tries to integrate the traditional with the modern by giving it spiritual meaning. Whether the simplicity of form, color, symmetry and tasteful alternation of ornaments that characterizes traditional pottery wil keep appealing to the public, that remains to be see They carry a ceramic gourd filled with tuica, a strong fruit brandy. Drinking the tuica signals acceptance of the invitation to the wedding. In other regions, the newlyweds offer their godparents a beautiful pitcher to be hung on the main beam of their home. The number of pitchers hanging is testimony to the respectability and appreciation the family enjoys in the communit.

Traditional Sculpture.

The symbolism in wood decoration has a long history dating back through pre-Christian times. Symbols are found on almost any wooden object, whether a huge gate, a walking stick, or a small keepsake chest. In regions where thirteenth century Saxon colonists settled, and in the Danube Delta region where Russian Lipovens arrived at the end of the last century, there are strong traditions of painted furniture. Motifs are usually floral, and their mellow, warm color palette works well with contemporary decor. Saxon-style painted furniture is currently enjoying a revival, and can be found in homes in Romania and abroad.

Waving and Colouring Textiles

Weaving still is widely practiced in rural villages and some cities throughout the country. The predominant fibers are wool and cotton. In many villages, women still spin their own yarn alongside village lanes, using wool from sheep that they tend Looms are commonly found in homes and are either horizontal or vertical. As with ceramics, textile patterns and colors vary regionally, with color schemes often based on specificcombinations of red, dark blue, black, and white. Over time, yellow, green, blue, and other bright hues have been introduced. The most popular cotton textile today usually has a red backgroundRug decoration has a specific regional character: in the Olt region, rugs have layered borders and floral, animal or human decorations; in Wallachia and in Translylvania, both in the Romanian and ethnic Hungarian villages, geometrical decorations are predominant; Moldavian artisans frequently use the tree of life motif lengthwise on the rugs; while the rugs in Banat are known for well defined, large geometrical motifs.In village workshops, women still know the secrets of creating plant and mineral dyes. This art form requires a vast knowledge of plant types and sensitivity to seasons, since distinct colors result from harvesting plants at different times in their growth. Some colors can be achieved only whencertain plants are harvested by moonlight. Weaving in Romania displays high artistry, excellent techniques, refined color and varied compositions.

Carpets & Rugs

Traditional Romanian rugs are varied and diverse from region to region. The most common is the kilim flat-weave, likely introduced through Ottoman influence centuries ago. Hand-woven on home looms, rugs- wool tapestries are used to cover floors and walls, with large pieces created by sewing several smaller sections together. Cooperatives across the country still make the more complicated hand-knotted pile rug. Each rug is an art piece, its color and composition bearing a certain message .

Rugs from Oltenia are distinguished by patterns that reflect nature: often flowers, birds and feminine silhouettes in traditional folk costumes; however, numerous weavers and cooperatives throughout the country have adopted motifs traditionally specific to Oltenia. In Moldova, rugs have a less pronounced border, with patterns consisting of little branches repeated in rows to create the tree of life. Another distinct style is found in Maramures. Using natural dye colors, a patchwork of alternating squares is created, each with a figure representing a scene from nature and daily life. Often, the border represents stars in heaven or a traditional village dance.

Painted Icons

This function of the icon determined the existence in almost every peasant house of church-hallowed icons, traditionally exhibited in the sacred spot of the room – the icon corner, which also lodges the votive lamp and the basil left from Epiphany. The Romanian peasant’s house is not designed as a functional, comfortable home, but as an "axis mundi" and "imago mundi", according to Mircea Eliade. It is a holy place, sanctified through ancient rituals by the hearth and fire, by the icons and God."

The traditional Byzantine method of creating an icon requires a number of time-consuming steps and uses formulas handed down through many generations. Another way to represent icons is through reverse painted glass.

This method was imported to Transylvania through Austria, from Tyrol and Bohemia. In 1699, the Austro-Hungarian Empire included Transylvania, and these two cultures conveyed significant traditions into the region. A monastery near Cluj started to produce reverse painted glass icons in the eighteenth century by interpreting engravings. The genre became so popular that soon entire villages specialized in producing reverse painted glass icons. The icon is venerated as an object of worship in the Orthodox rite only after having been ritually hallowed by the priest. The reason of its veneration is not material, as an object of itself, but it conformity with the Orthodox theological principle: any respect paid to the icon is in fact aime at the saint represented in it, whose sacred power manifests itself by way of the icon. In this way, the idolatry forbidden by the Old Testament is avoided, and the icon is only the vehicle of real, transcendent sanctity.