Stucco

Stucco is a fine plaster or cement used as a coating for walls or for decoration. It may be used to cover less visually appealing construction materials such as concrete blocks, steel, or adobe. Modern stucco is made mostly of Portland cement. It provides wall coatings with a defined structure. Traditionally, stucco has been used as a sculptural and artistic material.

Baroque and Rococo architecture makes heavy use of stucco. Examples can be found in churches and palaces, where stucco is mostly used to provide a smooth, decorative transition from walls to ceiling, decorating and giving measure to ceiling surfaces. Stucco is an integral part of the art of belcomposto, the baroque concept that smoothly integrates the three classic arts, architecture, sculpture, and painting.

Since stucco can be used as a decorative means, but also for figurative representation, it provides an ideal transitive link from architectural details to wall paintings such as the typically baroque trompe l'oeil ceilings. Here, the real architecture of the church is visually extended into a heavenly architecture with a depiction of Christ, the Virgin Mary or the Last Judgment at the center. Stucco is being used to form a semi-plastic extension of the real architecture that merges into the painted architecture.

Islamic art makes use of stucco as a decorative means in mosques and palaces. Indian architecture knows stucco as a material for sculpture in an architectural context.

Due to its "aristocratic" look, baroque looking stucco decoration was used frequently in upper-class apartments of the 19th and early 20th century.

It was also employed in the 1950's in pre-molded forms for deccorating the joins between walls and cealings inside houses. It was generaly painted the same colour as the cealing and used in designs where a picture rail or rat rail was in use.