Wool, Silk, Gold.
H. 11 ft. 4 in.
W. 9 ft. 6 in.
THE ANNUNCIATION: The Virgin, in a blue robe lined with red, is seated before a reading-desk in a white marble portico with a tile floor. Behind her is a red and metal gold brocade. The lily is in a majolica jar. The angel, in a green robe with yellow high lights lined with red, has alighted in a garden without. In the sky, God the Father holding the globe and two angels bearing a shield.
The treatment of the sky in two-toned blue and white striations, as well as the conventional landscape without perspective, with small oak and laurel trees, is characteristic of a number of tapestries of the opening years of the XVth century. Most of them depicted hunting scenes. But there was one famous religious piece, the Passion of the Cathedral of Saragossa. In the drawing of the figures and some of the details the piece is closely related to the paintings of that Paris school of which Jean Malouel is the most famous member. The work is by no means by Malouel, but it is similar to that of one of his lesser contemporaries, whose only known surviving work is a set of six panels painted on both sides, two of which are in the Cuvellier Collection at Niort and the others in the Mayer Van der Bergh Collection at Antwerp. The very primitively rendered Eternal Father is almost identical with the one that appears in several of the panels; the roughly indicated shaggy grass is the same, the rather unusual angle of the angel's wings recurs in the Cuvellier Annunciation, as does the suspended poise of the Virgin's attitude. The Virgin's reading-desk, too, is almost identical, though shown in the panel at the other side of the scene. The long, slim-fingered hands and the pointed nose and chin of the Virgin are characteristic of the school.
The tiles in the portico, so carefully rendered, are of interest because they are very similar to the earliest-known tile floor still in position—that of the Caracciolo Chapel in Naples. Some of the same patterns are repeated, notably that of the Virgin's initial and the star, which is more crudely rendered. The colors, too, are approximately the same, the brown being a fair rendering of the manganese purple of the chapel tiles. The majolica vase is also interesting as illustrating a type of which few intact examples are left.
Exhibited:
Chicago Art Institute, Gothic Exhibition, 1921.
Lent by P. W. French & Company.
The piece maintains a high level of æsthetic expression. The religious emotion is intensely felt and is adequately conveyed in the wistful sadness of the Virgin's face and the expectant suspense of her poised body. The portico seems removed from reality and flooded by a direct heavenly light, in its shining whiteness contrasting with the deep blue-green background. This tapestry by virtue of its intense and elevated feeling, purified by æsthetic calm and by its exceptional decorative vividness, ranks with the very great masterpieces of the graphic arts.
2 FRANCO-FLEMISH, EARLY XV CENTURY
Wool and Gold.
H. 5 ft. 5 in.
W. 5 ft. 11 in.
THE CHASE: A man in a long dark-blue coat and high red hat and a lady in a brown brocade dress and ermine turban watch a dog in leather armor attack a bear. A landscape with trees and flowers is indicated without perspective and a castle in simple outline is projected against a blue and white striated sky.
Exhibited:
South Kensington Museum, French-English Retrospective Exhibition of Textiles, 1921.