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THE
TAPESTRY
BOOK
BY
HELEN CHURCHILL CANDEE
AUTHOR OF "DECORATIVE STYLES AND PERIODS"
_WITH FOUR PLATES IN COLOUR AND NINETY-NINE
ILLUSTRATIONS IN BLACK-AND-WHITE_
NEW YORK
FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY
MCMXII
[Illustration: HERSE AND MERCURY
Renaissance Brussels Tapestry, Italian Cartoon. W. de Pannemaker,
weaver.
Collection of George Blumenthal, Esq., New York]
_Copyright, 1912,
by_ FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY
_All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign
languages, including the Scandinavian_
_October, 1912_
TO
TWO CERTAIN BYZANTINE MADONNAS
AND THEIR OWNERS
AN ACKNOWLEDGMENT
Modesty so dominates the staff in art museums that I am requested not
to make mention of those officers who have helped me with friendly
courtesy and efficiency. To the officers and assistants at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago,
the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and the Print Department in the
Library of Congress in Washington, indebtedness is here publicly
acknowledged with the regret that I may not speak of individuals.
Photographs of tapestries are credited to Messrs. A. Giraudon, Paris;
J. Laurent, Madrid; Alinari, Florence; Wm. Baumgarten, and Albert
Herter, New York, and to those private collectors whose names are
mentioned on the plates.
H. C. C.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I A FOREWORD 1
II ANTIQUITY 15
III MODERN AWAKENING 25
IV FRANCE AND FLANDERS, 15TH CENTURY 32
V HIGH GOTHIC 51
VI RENAISSANCE INFLUENCE 64
VII RENAISSANCE TO RUBENS 72
VIII ITALY, 15TH THROUGH 17TH CENTURIES 81
IX FRANCE 90
X THE GOBELINS FACTORY 105
XI THE GOBELINS FACTORY (_Continued_) 117
XII THE GOBELINS FACTORY (_Continued_) 126
XIII THE GOBELINS FACTORY (_Continued_) 135
XIV BEAUVAIS 145
XV AUBUSSON 154
XVI SAVONNERIE 159
XVII MORTLAKE 163
XVIII IDENTIFICATIONS 172
XIX IDENTIFICATIONS (_Continued_) 186
XX BORDERS 201
XXI TAPESTRY MARKS 216
XXII HOW IT IS MADE 226
XXIII THE BAYEUX TAPESTRY 241
XXIV TO-DAY 249
BEST PERIODS AND THEIR DATES 265
INDEX 267
ILLUSTRATIONS
HERSE AND MERCURY (_Coloured Plate_) _Frontispiece_
Renaissance Brussels Tapestry, Italian Cartoon. W. de
Pannemaker, weaver. Collection of George Blumenthal,
Esq., New York
FACING PAGE
CHINESE TAPESTRY 14
Chien Lung Period
COPTIC TAPESTRY 15
About 300 A. D.
COPTIC TAPESTRY 16
Boston Museum of Fine Arts
COPTIC TAPESTRY 17
Boston Museum of Fine Arts
TAPESTRY FOUND IN GRAVES IN PERU 18
Date prior to Sixteenth Century
THE SACRAMENTS (_Coloured Plate_) 34
Arras Tapestry, about 1430. Metropolitan Museum of Art,
New York
THE SACRAMENTS 38
Arras Tapestry, about 1430
THE SACRAMENTS 39
Arras Tapestry, about 1430
FIFTEENTH CENTURY, FRENCH TAPESTRY 40
Boston Museum of Fine Arts
THE LIFE OF CHRIST 41
Flemish Tapestry, second half of Fifteenth Century.
Boston Museum of Fine Arts
LA BAILLEE DES ROSES 42
French Tapestry, about 1450. Metropolitan Museum of Art,
New York
FIFTEENTH CENTURY MILLEFLEUR WITH ARMS 43
Cathedral of Troyes
THE LADY AND THE UNICORN 44
French Tapestry, Fifteenth Century. Musee de Cluny, Paris
THE LADY AND THE UNICORN 45
French Tapestry, Fifteenth Century. Musee de Cluny, Paris
THE SACK OF JERUSALEM (DETAIL) 46
Burgundian Tapestry, about 1450. Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York
SCENES FROM THE LIFE OF CHRIST, WITH ARMORIAL SHIELDS 48
Flemish Tapestry, Fifteenth Century. Institute of Art,
Chicago
HISTORY OF THE VIRGIN 49
Angers Cathedral
DAVID AND BATHSHEBA 50
German Tapestry, about 1450
FLEMISH TAPESTRY. ABOUT 1500 51
Collection of Alfred W. Hoyt, Esq.
DAVID AND BATHSHEBA 52
Flemish Tapestry, late Fifteenth Century
HISTORY OF ST. STEPHEN 53
Arras Tapestry, Fifteenth Century
VERDURE 54
French Gothic Tapestry
"ECCE HOMO" 55
Brussels Tapestry, about 1520. Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York
ALLEGORICAL SUBJECT 56
Flemish Tapestry, about 1500. Collection of Alfred W.
Hoyt, Esq.
CROSSING THE RED SEA 57
Brussels Tapestry, about 1500. Boston Museum of Fine Arts
THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN 58
Flemish Tapestry, about 1510. Collection of J. Pierpont
Morgan, Esq., New York
FLEMISH TAPESTRY, END OF FIFTEENTH CENTURY 60
Collection of Martin A. Ryerson, Esq., Chicago. Formerly
in the Spitzer Collection
THE HOLY FAMILY 61
Flemish Tapestry, end of Fifteenth Century. Collection
of Martin A. Ryerson, Esq., Chicago. Formerly in the
Spitzer Collection
CONQUEST OF TUNIS BY CHARLES V (DETAIL) 62
Cartoon by Jan Vermeyen. Woven by Pannemaker. Royal
Collection at Madrid
DEATH OF ANANIAS.--FROM ACTS OF THE APOSTLES BY RAPHAEL 64
From the Palace of Madrid
THE STORY OF REBECCA 65
Brussels Tapestry, Sixteenth Century. Collection of
Arthur Astor Carey, Esq., Boston
THE CREATION 66
Flemish Tapestry. Italian Cartoon, Sixteenth Century
THE ORIGINAL SIN 67
Flemish Tapestry. Italian Cartoon, Sixteenth Century
MELEAGER AND ATALANTA 68
Flemish design, second half of Seventeenth Century.
Woven in Paris workshops by Charles de Comans
PUNIC WAR SERIES 69
Brussels Tapestry. Sixteenth Century. Collection of
Arthur Astor Carey, Esq., Boston
EPISODE IN THE LIFE OF CAESAR 70
Flemish Tapestry. Sixteenth Century. Gallery of the
Arazzi, Florence
WILD BOAR HUNT 71
Flemish Cartoon and Weaving, Sixteenth Century. Gallery
of the Arazzi, Florence
VERTUMNUS AND POMONA 72
First half of Sixteenth Century. Royal Collection of
Madrid
VERTUMNUS AND POMONA 73
First half of Sixteenth Century. Royal Collection of
Madrid
VERTUMNUS AND POMONA 74
First half of Sixteenth Century. Royal Collection of
Madrid
VERTUMNUS AND POMONA 75
First half of Sixteenth Century. Royal Collection of
Madrid
TAPESTRIES FOR HEAD AND SIDE OF BED 76
Renaissance designs. Royal Collection of Madrid
THE STORY OF REBECCA 77
Brussels Tapestry. Sixteenth Century. Collection of
Arthur Astor Carey, Esq., Boston
BRUSSELS TAPESTRY. LATE SIXTEENTH CENTURY 78
Weaver, Jacques Geubels. Institute of Art, Chicago
MEETING OF ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA 79
Brussels Tapestry. Woven by Gerard van den Strecken.
Cartoon attributed to Rubens
THE ANNUNCIATION (_Coloured Plate_) 82
Italian Tapestry. Fifteenth Century. Collection of
Martin A. Ryerson, Esq., Chicago
ITALIAN TAPESTRY, MIDDLE OF SIXTEENTH CENTURY 84
Cartoon by Bacchiacca. Woven by Nicholas Karcher
ITALIAN TAPESTRY. MIDDLE OF SIXTEENTH CENTURY 85
Cartoon by Bacchiacca. Woven by G. Rost
ITALIAN VERDURE. SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 86
THE FINDING OF MOSES 90
Gobelins, Seventeenth Century. Cartoon after Poussin.
The Louvre Museum
TRIUMPH OF JUNO 91
Gobelins under Louis XIV
TRIUMPH OF THE GODS (DETAIL) 94
Gobelins, Seventeenth Century
TRIUMPH OF THE GODS (DETAIL) 95
Gobelins Tapestry
GOBELINS BORDER (DETAIL) SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 98
CHILDREN GARDENING 99
After Charles Lebrun. Gobelins, Seventeenth Century.
Chateau Henri Quatre, Pau
CHILDREN GARDENING 102
After Charles Lebrun. Gobelins, Seventeenth Century.
Chateau Henri Quatre, Pau
GOBELINS GROTESQUE 103
Musee des Arts Decoratifs, Paris
GOBELINS TAPESTRY, AFTER LEBRUN, EPOCH LOUIS XIV 104
Collection of Wm. Baumgarten, Esq., New York
THE VILLAGE FETE 105
Gobelins Tapestry after Teniers
DESIGN BY RUBENS 110
DESIGN BY RUBENS 111
DESIGN BY RUBENS 112
GOBELINS TAPESTRY. DESIGN BY RUBENS 113
Royal Collection, Madrid
LOUIS XIV VISITING THE GOBELINS FACTORY 114
Gobelins Tapestry, Epoch Louis XIV
GOBELINS TAPESTRY. TIME OF LOUIS XV 126
HUNTS OF LOUIS XV 130
Gobelins, G. Audran after Cartoon by Oudry
ESTHER AND AHASUERUS SERIES 131
Gobelins, about 1730. Cartoon by J. F. de Troy;
G. Audran, weaver
CUPID AND PSYCHE 132
Gobelins Tapestry. Eighteenth Century. Design by Coypel
PORTRAIT OF CATHERINE OF RUSSIA 133
Gobelins under Louis XVI.
CHAIR OF TAPESTRY. STYLE OF LOUIS XV 136
GOBELINS TAPESTRY (DETAIL) CRAMOISEE. STYLE LOUIS XV 137
HENRI IV BEFORE PARIS 146
Beauvais Tapestry, Seventeenth Century. Design by Vincent
HENRI IV AND GABRIELLE D'ESTREES 147
Design by Vincent
BEAUVAIS TAPESTRY. EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 148
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
BEAUVAIS TAPESTRY. TIME OF LOUIS XVI 149
Collection of Wm. Baumgarten, Esq., New York
BEAUVAIS TAPESTRY. TIME OF LOUIS XIV 150
BEAUVAIS TAPESTRY 152
CHAIR COVERING 153
Beauvais Tapestry. First Empire
SAVONNERIE. PORTRAIT SUPPOSABLY OF LOUIS XV 162
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
VULCAN AND VENUS SERIES. MORTLAKE 163
Collection of Philip Hiss, Esq., New York
VULCAN AND VENUS SERIES. MORTLAKE 168
Collection of Philip Hiss, Esq., New York
VULCAN AND VENUS SERIES. MORTLAKE 169
Collection of Philip Hiss, Esq., New York
THE EXPULSION OF VULCAN FROM OLYMPUS (_Coloured Plate_) 170
WEAVER AT WORK ON LOW LOOM. HERTER STUDIO 228
SEWING AND REPAIR DEPARTMENT. BAUMGARTEN ATELIERS 229
BAUMGARTEN TAPESTRY. LATE NINETEENTH CENTURY 230
BAUMGARTEN TAPESTRY. MODERN CARTOON 231
BAUMGARTEN TAPESTRY. MODERN CARTOON 234
BAYEUX TAPESTRY. (DETAIL) 1066 242
BAYEUX TAPESTRY. (DETAIL) 1066 243
BAYEUX TAPESTRY. (DETAIL) 1066 244
MODERN AMERICAN TAPESTRY, LOUIS XV INSPIRATION 250
MODERN AMERICAN TAPESTRY FROM FRENCH INSPIRATION 251
GOBELINS TAPESTRY. LATE NINETEENTH CENTURY 252
Luxembourg, Paris
GOBELINS TAPESTRY. LATE NINETEENTH CENTURY 253
Pantheon, Paris
THE ADORATION 256
Merton Abbey Tapestry. Figures by Burne-Jones
DAVID INSTRUCTING SOLOMON IN THE BUILDING OF THE TEMPLE 257
Merton Abbey Tapestry. Burne-Jones, Artist
TRUTH BLINDFOLDED 258
Merton Abbey Tapestry. Byram Shaw, Artist
THE PASSING OF VENUS 260
Merton Abbey Tapestry. Cartoon by Burne-Jones
ANGELI LAUDANTES 261
Merton Abbey Tapestry
AMERICAN (BAUMGARTEN) TAPESTRY COPIED FROM THE GOTHIC 262
DRYADS AND FAUNS 263
From Herter Looms, New York, 1910
THE TAPESTRY BOOK
CHAPTER I
A FOREWORD
The commercial fact that tapestries have immeasurably increased in
value within the last five years, would have little interest were it
not that this increase is the direct result of America's awakened
appreciation of this form of art. It has come about in these latter
days that tapestries are considered a necessity in the luxurious and
elegant homes which are multiplying all over our land. And the
enormous demand thus made on the supply, has sent the prices for rare
bits into a dizzy altitude, and has made even the less perfect pieces
seem scarce and desirable.
The opinion of two shrewd men of different types is interesting as
bearing on the subject of tapestries. One with tastes fully cultivated
says impressively, "Buy good old tapestries whenever you see them, for
there are no more." The other says bluffly, "Tapestries? You can't
touch 'em. The prices have gone way out of sight, and are going higher
every day." The latter knows but one view, the commercial, yet both
are right, and these two views are at the bottom of the present keen
interest in tapestries in our country. Outside of this, Europe has
collections which we never can equal, and that thought alone is
enough to make us snatch eagerly at any opportunity to secure a piece.
We may begin with our ambition set on museum treasures, but we can
come happily down to the friendly fragments that fit our private
purses and the wall-space by the inglenook.
Tapestries are not to be bought lightly, as one buys a summer coat, to
throw aside at the change of taste or circumstance. They demand more
of the buyer than mere money; they demand that loving understanding
and intimate appreciation that exists between human friends. A
profound knowledge of tapestries benefits in two ways, by giving the
keenest pleasure, and by providing the collector--or the purchaser of
a single piece--with a self-protection that is proof against fraud,
unconscious or deliberate.
The first step toward buying must be a bit of pleasant study which
shall serve in the nature of self-defence. Not by books alone,
however, shall this subject be approached, but by happy jaunts to
sympathetic museums, both at home and abroad, by moments snatched from
the touch-and-go talk of afternoon tea in some friend's salon or
library, or by strolling visits to dealers. These object lessons
supplement the book, as a study of entomology is enlivened by a chase
for butterflies in the flowery meads of June, or as botany is made
endurable by lying on a bank of violets. All work and no play not only
makes Jack a dull boy, but makes dull reading the book he has in hand.
The tale of tapestry itself carries us back to the unfathomable East
which has a trick at dates, making the Christian Era a modern epoch,
and making of us but a newly-sprung civilisation in the history of the
old grey world. After showing us that the East pre-empted originality
for all time, the history of tapestry lightly lifts us over a few
centuries and throws us into the romance of Gothic days, then trails
us along through increasing European civilisation up to the great
awakening, the Renaissance. Then it loiters in the pleasant ways of
the kings of France during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,
and finally falls upon modern effort, not limited to Europe now, but
nesting also in the New World which is especially our own.
Tapestry, according to the interpretation of the word used in this
book, is a pictured cloth, woven by an artist or a talented craftsman,
in which the design is an integral part of the fabric, and not an
embroidery stitched on a basic tissue. With this flat statement the
review of tapestries from antiquity until our time may be read without
fear of mistaking the term.
THE LOOM
The looms on which tapestries are made are such as have been known as
long as the history of man is known, but we have come to call them
high-warp and low-warp, or as the French have it, _haute lisse_ and
_basse lisse_. In the celebrated periods of weaving the high loom has
been the one in use, and to it is accredited a power almost
mysterious; yet the work of the two styles of loom are not
distinguishable by the weave alone, and it is true that the low-warp
looms were used in France when the manufacture of tapestries was
permanently established by the Crown about 1600. So difficult is it to
determine the work of the two looms that weavers themselves could not
distinguish without the aid of a red thread which they at one time
wove in the border. Yet because the years of the highest perfection in
tapestries have been when the high loom was in vogue, some peculiar
power is supposed to reside within it. That the high movements of the
fine arts have been contemporary with perfection in tapestries, seems
not to be taken into consideration.
NECESSARY FRENCH TERMS
French terms belong so much to the art of tapestry weaving that it is
hard to find their English equivalent. Tapestries of _verdure_ and of
_personnages_ describe the two general classes, the former being any
charming mass of greenery, from the Gothic _millefleurs_, and curling
leaves with animals beneath, to the lovely landscapes of sophisticated
park and garden which made Beauvais famous in the Eighteenth Century.
_Tapisseries des personnages_ have, as the name implies, the human
figure as the prominent part of the design. The shuttle or bobbin of
the high loom is called a _broche_, and that of the low loom a
_flute_. Weavers throughout Europe, whether in the Low Countries or in
France, were called _tapissiers_, and this term was so liberal as to
need explaining.
WORKERS' FUNCTIONS
The tapestry factory was under the guidance of a director; under him
were the various persons required for the work. Each tapestry woven
had a directing artist, as the design was of primary importance. This
man had the power to select the silks and wools for the work, that
they might suit his eye as to colour. But there was also a _chef
d'atelier_ who was an artist weaver, and he directed this matter and
all others when the artist of the cartoons was not present. Under him
were the tapissiers who did the actual weaving, and under these,
again, were the apprentices, who began as boys and served three years
before being allowed to try their hands at a "'prentice job" or essay
at finished work.
WEAVERS
The word weaver means so little in these days that it is necessary to
consider what were the conditions exacted of the weavers of tapestries
in the time of tapestry's highest perfection. A tapissier was an
artist with whom a loom took place of an easel, and whose brush was a
shuttle, and whose colour-medium was thread instead of paints. This
places him on a higher plane than that of mere weaver, and makes the
term tapissier seem fitter. Much liberty was given him in copying
designs and choosing colours. In the Middle Ages, when the Gothic
style prevailed, the master-weaver needed often no other cartoon for
his work than his own sketches enlarged from the miniatures found in
the luxurious missals of the day. These historic books were the
luxuries of kings, were kept with the plate and jewels, so precious
were considered their exquisitely painted scenes in miniature. From
them the master-weaver drew largely for such designs as _The Seven
Deadly Sins_ and other "morality" subjects.
Master-weavers were many in the best years of tapestry weaving;
indeed, a man must have attained the dignity and ability of that
position before being able to produce those marvels of skill which
were woven between 1475 and 1575 in Flanders, France and Italy. Their
aids, the apprentices, pique the fancy, as Puck harnessed to labour
might do. They were probably as mischievous, as shirking, as
exasperating as boys have ever known how to be, but those little
unwilling slaves of art in the Middle Ages make an appeal to the
imagination more vivid than that of the shabby lunch-box boy of
to-day.
DYERS
Accessory to the weavers, and almost as important, were the dyers who
prepared the thread for use. The conscientiousness of their work cries
out for recognition when the threads they dyed are almost unaltered in
colour after five hundred years of exposure to their enemies, light
and air. Dye stuffs were precious in those days, and so costly that
even threads of gold and silver (which in general were supplied by the
client ordering the tapestry) hardly exceeded in value certain dyed
wools and silk. All of these workers, from director down to
apprenticed lad, were bound by the guild to do or not do, according to
its infinite code, to the end that the art of tapestry-making be held
to the highest standards. The laws of the guilds make interesting
reading. The guild prevailed all over Europe and regulated all crafts.
In Florence even to-day evidences of its power are on every side, and
the Guildhall in London attests its existence there. Moreover, the
greatest artists belonged to the guilds, uniting themselves usually by
work of the goldsmith, as Benvenuto Cellini so quaintly describes in
his naive autobiography.
GUILDS
It was these same protective laws of the guilds that in the end
crippled the hand of the weaver. The laws grew too many to comply
with, in justice to talent, and talent with clipped wings could no
longer soar. At the most brilliant period of tapestry production
Flanders was to the fore. All Europe was appreciating and demanding
the unequalled products of her ateliers. It was but human to want to
keep the excellence, to build a wall of restrictions around her
especial craft that would prevent rivals, and at the same time to
press the ateliers to execute all the orders that piled in toward the
middle of the Sixteenth Century.
But although the guilds could make wise laws and enforce them, it
could not execute in haste and retain the standard of excellence. And
thus came the gradual decay of the art in Brussels, a decay which
guild-laws had no power to arrest.
GOTHIC PERIOD
The first period in tapestries which interests--except the remnants of
Egyptian and aboriginal work--is that of the Middle Ages, the early
Gothic, because that is when the art became a considerable one in
Europe. It is a time of romance, of chivalry, of deep religious
feeling, and yet seems like the childhood of modernity. Is it the
fault of crudity in pictorial art, or the fault of romances that we
look upon those distant people as more elemental than we, and thus
feel for them the indulgent compassion that a child excites? However
it is, theirs is to us a simple time of primitive emotion and romance,
and the tapestries they have left us encourage the whim.
The time of Gothic perfection in tapestry-making is included in the
few years lying between 1475 and 1520. Life was at that time getting
less difficult, and art had time to develop. It was no longer left to
monks and lonely ladies, in convent and castle, but was the serious
consideration of royalty and nobility. No need to dwell on the story
of modern art, except as it affects the art of tapestry weaving. With
the improvement of drawing that came in these years, a greater
excellence of weave was required to translate properly the meaning of
the artist. The human face which had hitherto been either blank or
distorted in expression, now required a treatment that should convey
its subtlest shades of expression. Gifted weavers rose to the task,
became almost inspired in the use of their medium, and produced such
works of their art as have never been equalled in any age. These are
the tapestries that grip the heart, that cause a _frisson_ of joy to
the beholder. And these are the tapestries we buy, if kind chance
allows. If they cannot be ours to live with, then away to the museum
in all haste and often, to feast upon their beauties.
RENAISSANCE
That great usurper, the Renaissance, came creeping up to the North
where the tapestry looms were weaving fairy webs. Pope Pius X wanted
tapestries, those of the marvellous Flemish weave. But he wanted those
of the new style of drawing, not the sweet restraint and finished
refinement of the Gothic. Raphael's cartoons were sent to Brussels'
workshops, and thus was the North inoculated with the Renaissance, and
thus began the second phase of the supreme excellency of Flemish
tapestries. It was the Renaissance expressing itself in the wondrous
textile art. The weavers were already perfect in their work, no change
of drawing could perplex them. But to their deftness with their medium
was now added the rich invention of the Italian artists of the
Renaissance, at the period of perfection when restraint and delicacy
were still dominant notes.
It was the overworking of the craft that led to its decadence. Toward
the end of the Sixteenth Century the extraordinary period of Brussels
perfection had passed.
But tapestry played too important a part in the life and luxury of
those far-away centuries for its production to be allowed to languish.
The magnificence of every great man, whether pope, king or dilettante,
was ill-expressed before his fellows if he were not constantly
surrounded by the storied cloths that were the indispensable
accessories of wealth and glory. Palaces and castles were hung with
them, the tents of military encampments were made gorgeous with their
richness, and no joust nor city procession was conceivable without
their colours flaunting in the sun as background to plumed knights and
fair ladies. Venice looked to them to brighten her historic stones on
days of carnival, and Paris spread them to welcome kings.
FRANCE
When, therefore, Brussels no longer supplied the tissues of her former
excellence, opportunity came for some other centre to rise. The next
important producer was Paris, and in Paris the art has consistently
stayed. Other brief periods of perfection have been attained
elsewhere, but Paris once establishing the art, has never let it drop,
not even in our own day--but that is not to be considered at this
moment.
Divers reigns of divers kings, notably that of Henri IV, fostered the
weaving of tapestry and brought it to an interesting stage of
development, after which Louis XIV established the Gobelins. From that
time on for a hundred years France was without a rival, for the
decadent work of Brussels could not be counted as such. Although the
work of Italy in the Seventeenth Century has its admirers, it is
guilty of the faults of all of Italy's art during the dominance of
Bernini's ideals.
AMERICAN INTEREST
America is too late on the field to enter the game of antiquity. We
have no history of this wonderful textile art to tell. But ours is the
power to acquire the lovely examples of the marvellous historied
hangings of other times and of those nations which were our forebears
before the New World was discovered. And we are acquiring them from
every corner of Europe where they may have been hiding in old chateau
or forgotten chest. To the museums go the most marvellous examples
given or lent by those altruistic collectors who wish to share their
treasures with a hungry public. But to the mellow atmosphere of
private homes come the greater part of the tapestries. To buy them
wisely, a smattering of their history is a requisite. Within the brief
compass of this book is to be found the points important for the
amateur, but for a profounder study he must turn to those huge volumes
in French which omit no details.
Not entirely by books can he learn. Association with the objects
loved, counts infinitely more in coming to an understanding. Happy he
who can make of tapestries the _raison d'etre_ for a few months'
loitering in Europe, and can ravish the eye and intoxicate the
imagination with the storied cloths found hanging in England, in
France, in Spain, in Italy, in Sweden, and learn from them the
fascinating tales of other men's lives in other men's times.
Then, when the tour is finished and a modest tapestry is hung at home,
it represents to its instructed owner the concentrated tale of all he
has seen and learned. In the weave he sees the ancient craftsman
sitting at his loom. In the pattern is the drawing of the artist of
the day, in the colours, the dyes most rare and costly; in the metal,
the gold and silver of a duke or prince; and in the tale told by the
figures he reads a romance of chivalry or history, which has the
glamour given by the haze of distant time to human action.
To enter a house where tapestries abound, is to feel oneself welcomed
even before the host appears. The bending verdure invites, the
animated figures welcome, and at once the atmosphere of elegance and
cordiality envelopes the happy visitor.
To live in a house abundantly hung with old tapestries, to live there
day by day, makes of labour a pleasure and of leisure a delight. It is
no small satisfaction in our work-a-day life to live amidst beauty, to
be sure that every time the eyes are raised from the labour of writing
or sewing--or of bridge whist, if you like--they encounter something
worthy and lovely. In the big living-room of the home, when the hours
come in which the family gathers, on a rainy morning, or on any
afternoon when the shadows grow grim outside and the afternoon
tea-tray is brought in whispering its discreet tune of friendly
communion, the tapestries on the walls seem to gather closer, to
enfold in loving embrace the sheltered group, to promise protection
and to augment brotherly love.
In the dining-room the glorious company assembles, so that he who eats
therein, attends a feast on Olympus, even though the dyspeptic's fast
be his lot. If the eyes gaze on Coypel's gracious ladies, under fruit
and roses, with adolescent gods adoring, what matters if the palate is
chastised? In a dining-room soft-hung with piquant scenes, even
buttermilk and dog-biscuit, burnt canvasback and cold Burgundy lose
half their bitterness.
When night is well started in its flight, perhaps one only, one lover
of the silence and the solitude, loath to give away to soft sleep the
quiet hours, this one remains behind when all the others have flown
bedward, and to him the neighbouring tapestries speak a various
language. From the easy chair he sees the firelight play on the
verdure with the effect of a summer breeze, the gracious foliage all
astir. The figures in this enchanted wood are set in motion and
imagination brings them into the life of the moment, makes of them
sympathetic playmates coaxing one to love, as they do, the land of
romance. Before their imperturbable jocundity what bad humour can
exist? All the old songs of mock pastoral times come singing in the
ears, "It happened on a day, in the merry month of May," "Shepherds
all and maidens fair," "It was a lover and his lass," "Phoebus arise,
and paint the skies," _et cetera_. Animated by the fire, in the
silence of the winter night the loving horde gathers and ministers to
the mind afflicted with much hard practicality and the strain of
keeping up with modern inexorable times. This sweet procession on the
walls, thanks be to lovely art, needs no keeping up with, merely asks
to scatter joy and to soften the asperities of a too arduous day.
All the way up the staircase in the house of tapestries are dainty
bits of _millefleurs_, that Gothic invention for transferring a block
of the spring woods from under the trees into a man-made edifice. It
may have a deep indigo background or a dull red--like the shades of
moss or like last year's fallen leaves--but over it all is abundantly
sprinkled dainty bluebells, anemones, daisies, all the spring beauties
in joyous self-assertion and happy mingling. With such flowery guides
to mark the way the path to slumberland is followed. Once within the
bedroom, the poppies of the hangings spread drowsy influence, and the
happy sleeper passes into unconsciousness, passes through the flowered
border of the ancient square, into the scene beyond, becomes one of
those storied persons in the enchanted land and lives with them in
jousts and tourneys or in _fetes champetres_ at lovely chateaux. The
magic spell of the house of tapestries has fallen like the dew from
heaven to bless the striver in our modern life of exigency and
fatigue.
[Illustration: CHINESE TAPESTRY
Chien Lung Period]
[Illustration: COPTIC TAPESTRY
About 300 A. D.]