IV.

European Tapestries

Tapestry weaving may have been practised in Europe as early as the 8th century, although no examples survive. Western European tapestry reached its greatest development between the 14th and 18th centuries. During the 19th and 20th centuries, however, revivals of the tapestry tradition occurred.

A.

Paris Workshops

In the 14th century the tapestry industry was centred in Paris and Flanders. The most famous Parisian example from this period is the Angers Apocalypse, now in the Musée des Tapisseries, Angers, France. It was woven by Nicolas Bataille (flourished late 14th century) in the 1370s and bears a religious narrative of the Revelation of St John the Divine. The original set contained seven pieces, each approximately 5 m (16y ft) high and 24.3 m (80 ft) long. From the same workshop came the Nine Heroes set (Metropolitan Museum, The Cloisters, New York).

B.

Arras Workshops

Arras, in Flanders, was the other great centre of the tapestry industry in the 14th century; the word arras became synonymous with tapestry. Arras regained its supremacy in the 15th century as the Parisian workshops began to fail. Its luxurious tapestries, woven on high-warp looms, depicted classical themes, chivalrous romances, and instructive allegories.

C.

Tournai and Brussels Workshops

Other important tapestry centres in the 15th century were the Flemish cities of Tournai and Brussels. Monumental tapestries produced at Tournai are typified by a heavily outlined and solemn Gothic style. By mid-century, Brussels led the industry with its reproduction of famous religious paintings by Flemish masters commissioned by the papacy and the royal houses of Spain and Austria. In the late 15th and early 16th centuries Brussels also became famous for its tapis d'or, or golden carpets, so called because of their profusion of gold threads. Also about this time the first marks identifying the workshop were woven into the tapestries.

D.

Gobelins, Beauvais, and Aubusson

The 17th century marked the end of the predominance of the Flemish centres, as religious persecution drove Protestant weavers abroad. As Henry IV established workshops in the Louvre in Paris and encouraged the immigration of Flemish weavers, the industry shifted to France. In 1662 the Gobelins workshop was officially established under the finance minister of Louis XIV, Jean-Baptiste Colbert. Shortly after the Gobelins workshop was opened, another major state-subsidized but private factory was established at Beauvais in 1664; it made tapestries for the nobility and rich bourgeoisie. Beauvais developed two types of decorative panels: verdures, or landscapes with vegetation, and grotesques, or decorative architectural compositions with small figures. The neighbouring town of Aubusson became famous for genre scenes on erotic themes derived from India, China, South America, and Africa. In the 18th century French tapestry became more decorative, adapted for the smaller salons of the Rococo period. Classical and contemporary military themes and pastoral scenes were popular. Towards the end of the 18th century the art of tapestry weaving declined but enjoyed a revival in the late 19th century.

E.

19th-Century Revival as an Art Form

During the 19th century, in tapestry weaving as in many other fields of craftmanship, mechanization took over manual production. For the first time, most tapestries were machine-woven, and as they became more affordable they were increasingly made for a new middle-class clientele. Artistic inspiration declined, and designs were now based on paintings or reproduced those of earlier tapestries. Late in the century, however, a revival in handcrafted tapestry took place, led by William Morris, the chief inspiration behind the Arts and Crafts movement. The factory Morris established at Merton Abbey, in Surrey, produced tapestries that reflected the ideals of medieval craftmanship; many were designed by Walter Crane, Edward Burne-Jones, and Morris himself.

F.

20th-Century Revivals

Followers of Morris were influential in the tapestry revival in 20th-century France. After World War I the tapestry industry at Aubusson was revitalized; in the 1930s most tapestries were copies of works by contemporary artists, but a few were especially designed as tapestries by such artists as Jean Lurçat. The creation of the design school of the Bauhaus in Weimar, Germany, in 1919, took modern tapestry in quite a different direction. Anni Albers combined craft and technology in abstract compositions designed for industrial production.

G.

Contemporary Tapestries

Beginning in the 1950s, what may be called truly modern tapestries emerged. Their monumental size and bulky, innovative materials clearly relate to the austerity and scale of modern architecture. A contemporary tapestry may be made by many different techniques; it may, for example, be woven on or off a loom, knotted, knitted, or crocheted. Textiles are no longer reliant on the loom and no longer seen as a branch of the decorative arts; they are recognized as individual creations along with painting and sculpture.

See also Art; Folk Art.