Openwork or open-work is a term in art history, architecture and related fields for any technique that produces decoration by creating holes, piercings, or gaps that go right through a solid material such as metal, wood, stone, pottery, cloth, leather, or ivory. Such techniques have been very widely used in a great number of cultures.
Openwork basket, English Bow porcelain, c. 1754–1755
Ancient Roman gold bracelet from the Hoxne Hoard. JULIANE is spelled out in opus interrasile openwork.
Intricate jalis from the Sidi Saiyyed mosque in Ahmedabad, India. From the inside
The secondary spires at Freiburg Minster
Scytho-Siberian art is the art associated with the cultures of the Scytho-Siberian world, primarily consisting of decorative objects such as jewellery, produced by the nomadic tribes of the Eurasian Steppe, with the western edges of the region vaguely defined by ancient Greeks. The identities of the nomadic peoples of the steppes is often uncertain, and the term "Scythian" should often be taken loosely; the art of nomads much further east than the core Scythian territory exhibits close similarities as well as differences, and terms such as the "Scytho-Siberian world" are often used. Other Eurasian nomad peoples recognised by ancient writers, notably Herodotus, include the Massagetae, Sarmatians, and Saka, the last a name from Persian sources, while ancient Chinese sources speak of the Xiongnu or Hsiung-nu. Modern archaeologists recognise, among others, the Pazyryk, Tagar, and Aldy-Bel cultures, with the furthest east of all, the later Ordos culture a little west of Beijing. The art of these peoples is collectively known as steppes art.
Horseman hunting, with characteristic Xiongnu horse trappings, Southern Siberia, 280-180 BCE. Hermitage Museum.
Scythian golden comb, made by Greeks probably to Scythian taste, from Solokha, near Kamianka-Dniprovska, Zaporizhzhia Oblast, Ukraine, early 4th century BCE, early 4th century BCE, Hermitage Museum
Gold plaque with panther from Chortomlyk kurgan, probably for a shield or breast-plate, 13 in/33 cm long, end 7th-century BC.
Gold Scythian pectoral, or neckpiece, from a royal kurgan in Tolstaya Mogila, Pokrov, Ukraine, dated to the second half of the 4th century BC.