Verdure with Bird
probably Aubusson
Category
Tapestries
Date
circa 1650 - circa 1700
Materials
Wool, Silk, Linen
Measurements
2550 x 3500 mm
Order this imageCollection
Packwood House, Warwickshire (Accredited Museum)
NT 557887
Summary
Tapestry, wool and silk, 3½-4 warps per cm, Verdure with Bird, Aubusson, c. 1650-1700. A verdure tapestry with a vertical join down the centre. The upper part of the tapestry is taken up with the foliage of two large trees, and in the foreground are two flowering plants and a bird on a brown ground. Beyond the trees on the left is a castle above a bridge. The border is composed of flowers and scrolls mainly in blue and beige, with a wide band of beige and dark brown on the inside of the border. The tapestry is coarsely woven and has a number of repairs. A pale brown wool repp galloon has been attached around all four edges.Replacement blue wool galloons have been attached around all four edges.
Full description
The large foreground plants, dense foliage in the background, distant buildings glimpsed through the trees, and prominent foreground bird are typical of verdure tapestries woven in both France and the Netherlands in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. This tapestry can be fairly securely attributed to the French weaving centre of Aubusson on the basis of the design. The small castle is typical of Aubusson verdures. Similar patterns of flowers and scrolls are found on a number of Aubusson tapestries, for example a group of verdures in Wawel Royal Castle, Cracow (Hennel-Bernasikowa 2000, cat. nos. 45, 53, 54), and a number of other examples in French museums and private collections (Chevalier, Chevalier and Bertrand, pp. 54-56). (Helen Wyld, 2009)
Provenance
Given to the National Trust by Graham Baron Ash in 1941
Credit line
Packwood House, The Graham Baron Ash Collection (The National Trust)
Makers and roles
probably Aubusson, workshop
References
Chevalier, Chevalier and Bertrand, 1988: Dominique Chevalier, Pierre Chevalier and Pascal-François Bertrand, Les Tapisseries d'Aubusson et de Felletin 1457-1791, Paris 1988 Hennel-Bernasikowa, 2000: Maria Hennel-Bernasikowa, Gobeliny XV-XIX wieku w Zamku Królewskim na Wawelu (Tapestries at Wawel Royal Castle 15th-19th centuries), Cracow 2000