Enormous Uses of Tapestry in Olden Days

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Thursday, 24 July 2008

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By:Mitch Johnson

Tapestry was woven on a loom usually in large sizes. Many types of threads were used in making the laces like silk, gold and silver threads weaving different picture on subjects including the and Biblical history, mythology, and peasant scenes after Teniers, etc.

Tapestry
Tapestry was used as a wall covering and, unlike needlework, was woven on a loom. Also, it was made in much larger sizes than would normally be worked in hand-stitched embroidery; panels of tapestry ten or twelve feet in height and twenty feet long are not uncommon. Wool was the material employed principally, but for special purposes silk was used. Gold and silver threads appear in many of the finest examples.

Brussels was the principal centre of tapestry weaving from about the year 1500, and the enormous output over the years varied greatly in quality. Subjects included Roman and Biblical history, mythology, and peasant scenes after Teniers.

Seventeenth-and eighteenth-century examples are often marred by the fact that time has faded their red dyes to a murky brown. Many Brussels tapestries bear a mark: a shield with a capital B at either side, or individual weavers sometimes added their names or initials. In France there were two important factories:

Beauvais and Gobelins, both founded in the second half of the seventeenth century. The former was a private concern with State support, the latter was a Royal factory and not until late in the eighteenth century could any of its productions be purchased. Both did work of high quality, Beauvais being especially famous for a series of panels based on the Fables of La Fontaine, and for many sets of chair and settee covers.

The latter were made also at Gobelins, where in about 1775 they made some noteworthy sets of matching wall hangings and furniture covers. A superb example of this decorative harmony, in a room designed by Robert Adam, remains at Osterley Park, near London, and a suite of furniture (parted from its wall-hangings but still with its Gobelins covers) made for Moor Park in Hertfordshire, is now in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. A few more of these rich ensembles are still intact, but a set of tapestries made for a salon at Croome Park in Warwickshire was sold some years ago for the sum of Ł50,000, and is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

At Aubusson, also in France, tapestry panels, chair covers and also tapestry carpets were made. Much of the output dates from the nineteenth century, although it is similar in pattern to work of an earlier period.

Michael and Philip Wauters, who specialized in supplying foreign markets, wove tapestry in Antwerp. Many of the panels made popular by other factories were copied with success, and these Flemish tapestries are confused frequently with the English productions they imitate.

The principle center of tapestry weaving was Brussels. The two important centres of tapestry in France in the second half of the seventeenth century were Beauvais and Gobelins.

Article Source: http://www.dailynewarticles.com

Mitch Johnson is a regular writer for http://www.kitchen-plans-n-designs.com/ , http://www.ezcollectablesguide.info/ , http://www.bathroomaccessoriesmadeeasy.info/