French Verdure tapestry fragment, 18th century

Tapestries are made using a warp wrapping technique known as slit weft tapestry. Their production was woven on a grand scale and required great skill involving many elements and materials. Weaving tapestries was big business in medieval and renascence Europe requiring highly trained artisans and engineers.

The scenes in Verdure tapestries were a departure from the biblical and mythological themes one encountered in earlier tapestry production. Their subject matter in keeping with the Rococo and Romantic style was landscapes, rendered with deep thick foliage, aristocracy enjoying nature, and pictures of indigenous wildlife. Castles were often depicted in the distance.

I regard this fragment as a botanical abstraction. Yes the fragment has obvious references to plants and flowers, but for me the image goes far beyond a piece of a romantic landscape. Just as its mother tapestry was composed of a variety of parts, each independently abstract but functioning as an essential part of the totality of the image, this fragment alone with its floral disc and jungle of green pleases me much the same as a Japanese textile would.


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The Antique Rug Fragment as Serious Art

There are passages in all art that can exist independently as a meaningful aesthetic, functioning separately from the complete work they once belonged to. In these frames we see pieces from archaic rugs, fragments from their mother rug, which had over time been destroyed. Occasionally areas of these old surviving pieces can exist on their own, and still express spirituality, decoration, a sense of magic and what it means to live in a timeless culture. The events that have defined all human life are symbolically addressed here: giving birth, raising a family, tending to animals, accepting the inevitability of death and the absolute belief in the existence of an immutable godhead. These fragments express all that we look for in an art object: beauty, honesty and mastery of craft. These humble fragments establish a life of their own, one that takes us directly without distraction to the essence of rug art.