An Old Lacemaker
An Old Lacemaker
Verviers, in Liège, was the center of the wool-spinning industry. Here again the superior skill of the artisans established the reputation of the Belgian article. Most of the wool came from Australia and the Cape.
For its flax spindles, however, Belgium raised its own material. The flax of Courtrai was considered the best in all Europe. More than half the finished thread was exported to England. The abundance of this material doubtless led to the early development of lace-making, for which the women of the country became so famous.
Flanders claims to be the birthplace of pillow-lace—dentelles aux fuseaux—and disputes with Italy the invention of lace generally. In earlier times drawn or cut work was often confused with lace, as was embroidery of one sort or another, and for this reason it is difficult to trace the art definitely back to its beginning. Ornamental needlework was done in Old Testament days, for Isaiah mentions those who “work in fine flax and weave networks.” But real lace-making—the interweaving of fine threads of flax, cotton, silk, of silver, gold or hair, to form a network—did not appear till the time of the Renaissance, when all the arts of Europe awoke to life. In a chapel at St. Peter’s, in Louvain, was an altar-piece painted in 1495 by QuentinMatsys, which showed a girl making lace on a pillow like those still in use to this day.
The manufacture of lace began in Brussels about the year 1400. The city excelled from the first in the quality of the work done there. This was due to the fineness of the thread of Brabant, which the women spun inch by inch with such painstaking care that it defied competition. A pound of flax was sometimes transmuted into lace worth several thousand dollars.
The lace industry was the only one in Flanders which survived the upheavals of the sixteenth century. Its prosperity alone tided the distracted people over their difficulties and saved them from the ruin which threatened. The women plodded on at their slow task, hour after hour, thread after thread, for a pitiful few cents a day, and never knew that they had saved their country. “They are generally almost blind before thirty years of age,” wrote an early chronicler.
The women of Belgium have always been specially adept with the needle, and it may be that the rainy weather so prevalent there had something to do with the development of this indoor industry. Certainly lace-making is—or was, until very recently—practised in all the provincesexcept Liège, and in some districts it could be said that every woman, young or old, handled the bobbins or the needle. It was, indeed, the national industry.
As a rule, the women worked to order and by contract, and were paid by the piece. The lace, when finished, was handed over to the local middleman, who, in turn, sold it to the contractors in the cities. The children learned the art from their mother or—more often—from the nuns in the various convent schools. They would enter these schools when six or eight years old, and often remained there till their marriage. The nuns did much to keep up the ancient traditions of the art, and even in their convents in the Far East today they make a point of teaching the native children to copy European laces.
There are two kinds of lace, point and pillow. The former is made with a needle, and its characteristic feature is the “set-off” of the flowers. The needle laces, of Belgium are divided into Brussels point, Brussels appliqué, Venice, rose and Burano points.
Several classes of workers are needed for each piece—those who make the openwork ornaments and the flowers, and those who apply them on to the background, a very delicate task. Brussels point is the finest example ofthis form of lace, and indeed of any lace made in Belgium at the present time. The designs are very elaborate, with the flowers often in relief. Modern Brussels point is, however, too frequently an imitation, with flowers sewn on to a machine-made net that is often rather coarse, while the application is done by unskilled fingers.
Of pillow lace there are many kinds, and their chief characteristic is the outline of the design. The lace is made on a cushion or pillow which stands on a frame, with little spools or bobbins for the threads, and pins for fixing the lace on the pattern.
The best kinds of pillow lace are duchess, Mechlin, and Valenciennes. “Valenciennes the eternal,” they called it, because by working fourteen hours a day for a year you made less than half a yard. Marie Therèse had a dress of it which took a year to make and cost fourteen thousand dollars. Considering that the workers received barely a cent an hour, one gets some idea of the magnitude of the task. The Béguinage in Ghent was the headquarters for the manufacture of this lace, but only a few old nuns remain there now who know the secrets of its making. Machine-made imitations flood the market, and the former process is too costly tomake it worth any one’s while to master it.
BRUSSELS POINT LACE.
BRUSSELS POINT LACE.
Mechlin is the Flemish name for the town of Malines, and both words are used in connection with the lace which originated there. Mechlin is the airiest and most exquisite of laces, but its very delicacy made it too costly, and since it could be so easily and cheaply imitated, it is no longer made by hand. It was constructed in one piece, with no application, a flat thread forming the flower and giving it almost the appearance of embroidery. Napoleon, who admired it greatly, cried out when he saw the delicate spire of Antwerp Cathedral that it was like “la dentelle de Malines.”
In spite of the fact that the art of making lace had fallen upon hard days, the lacemakers’ ball was still an important event of the season when we were in Brussels. It came in carnival week, and was the occasion on which the Société de la Grande Harmonie received the King and Queen. It interested me to see how Their Majesties were welcomed by such a representative body of middle-class citizens—there was the most genuine enthusiasm I have ever seen shown towards royalty.
The Diplomatic Corps had been invited to attend, and we were taken to a platform at the end of a great room, where the royal chairs wereplaced, and chairs in rows for the Corps and the Court and the Ministers of State. Beyond the columns which divided the hall into three parts were arranged the seats for the members of the society. The center of the floor remained clear, and here the tableaux and pageants representing the various stages in the history of lace were performed. In their pageant the lacemakers all wore examples of their craft.
One of the prettiest incidents occurred when the groups of costumed personages separated and there passed along the length of the ballroom floor two little children, a boy and a girl, dressed as a page and a miniature lady-in-waiting. They advanced slowly, and presented to the King and Queen books which told of the evening’s entertainment. The Queen rose and apparently questioned the president of the society about the little girl who stood so shyly before her. Then, taking the book, she stooped down and kissed her. It was very prettily and naturally done, and caused a round of appreciative applause and cries of “Long live the Queen!”
Another attractive feature was that of the tiny children who represented the Flemish lacemakers, each one wearing the costume of the trade. They passed in procession before theQueen and each, with a little courtesy, laid a bouquet of flowers at her feet.
I was surprised to find that Brussels was the market for lace from all over the world, and that foreign laces of every description were copied there by the skilfuldentellières. This was still true, in spite of the marked decline which the industry had shown of late, especially since the introduction of machinery.
Where a generation ago one hundred and fifty thousand women were employed, in 1910 there were barely twenty thousand. Their product had lost in quality, too, as well as in quantity. The old nuns who did the wonderful, intricate stitches, were dying off and there were none to take their places. The pattern-makers, also, were contenting themselves with easier designs. Belgium was “speeding up,” with the rest of the world, and the painstaking arts had to suffer. Modern laces are carelessly made, in comparison with those of former days, and from inferior designs.
The wages paid those who still work at the craft seem low indeed, especially when the long years of apprenticeship are considered. Verhaegen, in statistics collected in 1910, cites a girl of thirteen who was working ten hours a day, making in fifty-five hours a meter of Cluny lacefor which she received about fifty cents. Children of fourteen were working seventy-two hours a week for something less than a cent an hour, and grown women earned little more. The workers were not organized, and the middlemen seem to have prospered accordingly.
But the pay was low in all branches of industry, even those which were well organized. An English writer noted that the rate of wages per hour for men in Belgium was only about half that prevailing in Britain, while the cost of living was nearly the same. The average earnings of the breadwinner of the family were about $165 a year. These facts certainly account for the development of coöperation.
This movement, which had a great vogue throughout the country, started in Ghent in 1873. Bread was scarce, and famine prices prevailed. A group of poor weavers conceived the idea of baking for themselves and their friends at cost. Their capital consisted of the vast sum of seventeen dollars and eighteen cents. Their bakery was in a cellar, and their utensils were antiquated. They could not afford a dog to deliver their wares, which were taken from door to door in a basket. But this was only the beginning. The “free bakers,” as they calledthemselves, came to have for their headquarters one of the finest buildings in Ghent.
A few years later Edouard Anseele, realizing the power of the new movement, decided that it should be identified with Socialism for their mutual benefit. To that end was organized the Vooruit, which has branches all over Belgium, and in other countries as well.
Instead of returning the profits made on bread sold at market prices to the purchasers, as had been originally done, a percentage was retained for the support of the organization in its various departments. There was a mutual benefit fund, for instance: bread was sent to members out of work; a doctor went to those who were ill; a trained nurse was at hand to look after the first baby and to instruct the mother in its care.
When the Church set up rival bakeries, the Vooruit went farther. It established its first “maison du peuple,” which has since been duplicated in many places. Every need of the people was supposed to find here its satisfaction. There was a café, with tables in the park, and lights and music. There were lectures, dances, debates, concerts, movies. There was a theater where the actors and the plays were chosen by the vote of the audience, which, by the way, strongly favoured their own Maeterlinck. Besidesa library and a day nursery, there was a big department store, and in the same building were the headquarters for all the allied and friendly organizations—trade unions, coöperative and socialistic societies, and so on.
One of the most interesting activities of the Vooruit was the traveling club for children, bands of whom went from town to town, picking up recruits as they went, seeing their own land first, then—this was before the war—crossing the border into France or Germany, where the local Vooruits made them welcome. A common practice was for children of the French and Flemish parts of the country to be exchanged for long visits, so that they might have a chance to learn each other’s language.
When the organization, which had always before refused to sell alcoholic drinks, found itself bitterly opposed by the liquor interests, especially in the mining districts, it built breweries of its own. In this way it was able to give the working men pure beer at a very low cost.
The Maison du Peuple in Brussels was established in 1881, with a capital of about one hundred dollars. It began, like the one in Ghent, as a bakery, and owned a dog and a small cart to make deliveries. At last accounts the society had over ninety dogs. It is amusing to readthat these had their own kitchens, where their cooking was done, and their bathrooms, where they were kept clean.
And when one is speaking of the workers of Belgium, the dogs should not be forgotten, for the larger breeds were very useful members of the industrial system. Laundresses, bakers and vendors used them in distributing their wares, and they were of great service on the farm. But perhaps the commonest sight was that of a dog hitched to a cart filled with shining brass and copper milk cans. They were all carefully inspected to see that their harness fitted properly, and that they were provided with a drinking bowl and with a mat to lie down on when they were tired.
The Government made a point, indeed, of seeing that conditions were as comfortable as possible for the animals. The poor cannot afford to keep a dog simply for a pet; there are no scraps from the table to feed him, because no thrifty housewife leaves any scraps; he must do his share and earn his keep like the others.
At a time when France laid a heavy tax on imported laces, dogs made excellent smugglers. They were kept for a time on the French side of the line, petted and well fed; then they were sent over into Belgium, where they were allowedto become thoroughly homesick. Skins of larger dogs were lined with contraband lace and tied on to them, and they were headed for home and set free. Of course they naturally sought their own firesides, and the lace went with them. When the ruse was discovered, over forty thousand of them were captured and put to death.
Since the war began, dogs have been of great service in dragging the mitrailleuses, the light machine-guns, as well as in helping their masters carry their household goods to a place of safety. The police dogs were wonderfully trained, and have been used by the Red Cross to find the wounded in remote places and to carry first aid.
The same high standards of efficiency by which Belgian workmen made a national reputation for their various manufactures showed also in the cultivation of the ground. The whole western part of the country was one vast market-garden, but it was no happy chance of soil and climate that made it so. Generations of unbroken toil on the part of a patient, skilful peasantry, equipped with the most primitive tools but with a positive genius for their work, were necessary. So recently as the first half of the nineteenth century there was a wild stretch of land west of the Scheldt known as the Paysde Waes, which was uncultivated and desolate. Today it is wonderfully fertile, its little truck farms supporting five hundred people to the mile.
"SINCE THE WAR BEGAN, DOGS HAVE BEEN OF GREAT SERVICE IN DRAGGING THE MITRAILLEUSES."
"SINCE THE WAR BEGAN, DOGS HAVE BEEN OF GREAT SERVICE IN DRAGGING THE MITRAILLEUSES."
Flanders as a whole, indeed, had poor soil, often “an almost hopeless blowing sand.” The method of reclamation usually began with the planting of oats, rye or broom. This was used three years for forage and then plowed in, after which the land became capable of producing clover. The rotation of crops was worked out with great care, according to the special needs of the soil. The Belgian wheat crop averaged thirty-seven bushels to the acre in 1913, while in the same year “up-to-the-minute” America raised only fifteen bushels.
The soil is particularly suited to hemp and flax, the latter furnishing not only oil but fiber, of which the British markets bought ten million dollars’ worth annually. Poppies were grown for oil. Tobacco yielded two tons to the acre, and white carrots eight hundred bushels.
The Flemish farmer did most of his work by hand, with no other implement than a spade, which has been called the national tool. The population was so large that human labour was cheaper than animal. In sixteen days a man could dig up an acre of land as well as a horsecould plow it. A farmer was able to support himself, his wife and three children, keep a cow and fatten a hog, on two and a half acres. With another acre he had a surplus product to carry to market. A man with a capable wife and children could do all the work on six acres and have time left for outside interests. If he was fortunate enough to have horses they were the pride of his heart and he kept them always finely groomed and in the pink of condition.
The women of the country married early, raised large families, and worked hard. They were good managers, especially in the Walloon districts where they often carried on some industry besides their housekeeping. For centuries their chief employment was making lace. The Government established schools of housekeeping, where the girls learned domestic economy in every branch; they were sent to market, for instance, with six cents to buy the materials for a meal, which they afterwards cooked and served.
The Government indeed did everything it could to improve conditions in the country districts and to encourage farming. It established schools of agriculture, with dairy classes for the girls, and aided in starting coöperative societies. Its policies were far-seeing and markedby a really paternal interest, as well they might have been, for to her sturdy peasants—and to the peasants’ sturdy wives—were due the foundations of Belgian prosperity.
ASwe were intensely interested in tapestries we often went to the Museum to study and admire the most famous set in Brussels, an early Renaissance series of four pieces, called Notre Dame du Sablon.
These hangings illustrate an old fourteenth-century story, which I condense from Hunter’s delightful work on “Tapestries.” Beatrix Stoelkens, a poor woman of Antwerp, was told by the Virgin in a dream to get from the church of Notre Dame a little image of the Madonna. In obedience to the vision she obtained the statuette and took it to a painter, who decorated it in gold and colours. After Beatrix had returned it to the church, the Virgin clothed it with such grace that it inspired devotion in all who saw it. Then Our Lady appeared a second time to Beatrix, and directed her to carry the statue to Brussels. When she attempted to get it, the warden of the church interfered, but he found himself unable to move, and Beatrix bore awaythe little Madonna in triumph. She embarked for Brussels in an empty boat, which stemmed the current as if piloted by unseen hands. On arriving at her destination, she was received by the Duke of Brabant and the magistrates of the city, and the precious little statue was carried in procession to the church of Notre Dame du Sablon.
This set bears the date 1518, when Brussels was no longer under a Burgundian Duke, but Charles V was ruler of the Netherlands. The designer of the set followed the Gothic custom of representing the story under the forms of his own day, so, instead of the Duke of Brabant, Philip the Fair, father of Charles V, is pictured receiving the Madonna from the hands of Beatrix at the wharf, Charles V and his brother Ferdinand are bearing it in a litter to the church, and Margaret of Austria, aunt of Charles, kneels in prayer before the niche where the sacred image has been placed.
When in New York it always gives us pleasure to go to the Metropolitan Museum to see the finest Belgian set in the United States, the Burgundian Sacraments, woven in the early fifteenth century. This splendid example of Gothic workmanship was made in the days when Philip the Good had brought the power of Burgundyto its zenith. When the great Duke wanted to have magnificent hangings for the chamber of his son (who was afterward Charles the Bold), he ordered a set of tapestries from the weavers of Bruges. All that remains of this splendid work of art is now in the New York Museum—five pieces, which form half of the original set. The complete series consisted of two rows of scenes, the upper seven representing the Origin of the Seven Sacraments, the lower, the Seven Sacraments as Celebrated in the Fifteenth Century. This set shows wonderful weaving, “with long hatchings that interpret marvelously the elaborately figured costumes and damask ground.”
There are other exquisite tapestries in America, too, for the Committee of Safety in 1793 imported some American wheat into France, and when the time came to pay it profferedassignats. Naturally enough, the Americans objected, but there was no money. “Then they offered, and the United States was obliged to accept in payment, some Beauvais tapestries and some copies of the Moniteur.”
Tapestries required muscular strength, for the material was heavy, and so men were given this work in town workshops. The ladies did the needle, bobbin and pillow work in the castlesand convents. True tapestry is always woven on a loom, and is a combination of artistic design with skill in weaving.
This tapestry industry was introduced into Western Europe in the Middle Ages by the Moors, but we can trace the art of making woven pictures to much earlier times. The ancient Romans had them. Ovid describes the contest in weaving between Arachne and Pallas, in which the maiden wrought more beautifully than the goddess. Pallas in anger struck the maid, who hanged herself in her rage because she dared not return the blow. The goddess, relenting, changed Arachne into a spider, and she continues her weaving to this day.
But a much earlier poet has described the making of tapestry. We read in the Odyssey that, when the return of Ulysses to his native land was long delayed, his faithful wife Penelope postponed a decision among the suitors who importuned her by promising to make a choice when she had finished weaving the funeral robe for Laertes, her husband’s father. The robe was never completed, for each night she took out the work of the day before.
It is a very interesting fact that a Grecian vase has come down to us on which is a painting of Penelope and her son Telemachus. Penelopeis seated at what the experts say is certainly a tapestry loom, though somewhat different from those used at a later day.
We have no large pieces done by the Greeks and the Romans, but many small bands for use as trimmings of robes. Some of these were woven by the Greeks as early as the fourth century B.C., others were made in Egypt under Roman rule some centuries later, and are called Coptic. From these one can trace the series through the silken Byzantine, Saracenic and Moorish dress tapestries to the Gothic fabrics of the fourteenth century.
The Flemish and Burgundian looms were those of Arras, Brussels, Tournai, Bruges, Enghien, Oudenarde, Middlebourg, Lille, Antwerp, and Delft in Holland. The value of the tapestry industry to Flanders may be judged from the fact that Arras, a city of no importance whatever, from which not a single great artist had come, led all Europe for about two centuries in tapestry weaving.
Although some fine pieces were woven in the fourteenth century, as far as known, only two sets of Arras tapestries of this period are left. One set is at the cathedral of Angers in rather bad condition, for they were not appreciated at one time, and were used in a greenhouse and cutup as rugs. Fortunately, they have been restored and returned to the cathedral. The other set of early Arras hangings is to be found at the cathedral of Tournai, in Belgium. A piece of this set bore an inscription—which has fortunately been preserved for us—stating, “These cloths were made and completed in Arras by Pierrot Féré in the year one thousand four hundred two, in December, gracious month. Will all the saints kindly pray to God for the soul of Toussaint Prier?” Toussaint Prier, a canon of the cathedral in 1402, was the donor of the tapestries.
When Louis XI of France captured Arras, in 1477, and dispersed the weavers, Tournai, Brussels, Oudenarde and Enghien took up the work. The oldest Brussels tapestries known belong to the latter part of the fifteenth century. Two of these sets were painted by Roger van der Weyden and celebrated the Justice of Trajan and the Communion of Herkenbald. Some have tried to prove that other important tapestries were designed by the great primitives, but Max Rooses assures us the resemblance to their work comes from the fact that their characteristics, “careful execution, extreme delicacy of workmanship, and brilliancy of colour,” pervaded every branch of art at that period.
Brussels and Oudenarde held the lead throughout the sixteenth century. The Bruxellois wove vast historical compositions to decorate the palaces of kings; the weavers of Oudenarde produced landscapes, “verdures” and scenes from peasant life for the homes of burghers.
Tapestries are at their best as line drawings; when more complicated effects are sought “confusion and uncertainty follow.” The finest ever woven were produced during the last half of the fifteenth and the first half of the sixteenth centuries, when Gothic tapestries gradually ceased to be made and Renaissance pieces began to take their place. During that hundred years, when the weavers were most skilful and were still satisfied with line drawings, many of the finest tapestries combined the characteristics of both styles.
In the sixteenth century, the weavers had such marvelous skill, however, that they actually reproduced the shadow effects of Italian designs. Even such great artists as Raphael and Michael Angelo drew cartoons, and stories of ten, twenty or even thirty scenes were woven, all showing the distinctive characters of Renaissance art. They combined breadth of composition and lively action with the introduction ofnude figures and elaborate landscape and architectural settings. But in trying to copy painting too closely, they departed from the best traditions of tapestry technique, and deterioration was sure to follow in time.
After the desolating wars of the sixteenth century, when arts and industries revived under the Archdukes Albert and Isabella, Brussels weavers set up their looms again, and “Rubens brought new life into tapestry manufacture. He supplied the Brussels workshops with four great series—the History of Decius Mus, destined for some Genoese merchants; the Triumphs and Types of the Eucharist, ordered by the Infanta Isabella for the convent of the Clares at Madrid; the History of the Emperor Constantine, executed for Louis XIII; and the History of Achilles, for Charles I.... The Triumphs and Types of the Eucharist are the most powerful allegories ever created to glorify the mysteries of the Catholic religion.”[4]
Jacob Jordaens also designed tapestry cartoons, but the most popular artist among the weavers at the end of the seventeenth and in the eighteenth centuries was David Teniers. He did not himself make designs, but the manufacturers, especially at Oudenarde, borrowed hissubjects, which were drawn largely from peasant and village life.
One reason why we have so few of the really antique tapestries is that in 1797 the market for them was so dead—owing to the increasing use of wall-papers and canvases painted in oils—that the French decided it would be better to burn them for the gold and silver they contained. Accordingly, “One hundred and ninety were burned. During the French Revolution, a number of tapestries that bore feudal emblems were also burned at the foot of the Tree of Liberty.” At this time, when they were not in fashion, many rare old hangings were cut up by the inartistic or the ignorant and used as rugs and curtains.
But in recent years, we are told, the Brothers Braquenié have set up a workshop at Malines, where they have produced a fine series for the Hôtel de Ville in Brussels, called “Les Serments et les Métiers de Bruxelles.” The cartoons for this set were made by Willem Geefs, the painter.
As to the material, there is a great difference. Gothic tapestries are composed of woolen weft on linen, or woolen on hemp warp, and are often enriched with gold and silver thread. These are not used today, as they are considered too expensive. Since the sixteenth century, Brussels,Gobelins, and Mortlake have used a great deal of silk. In the fifteenth century fifteen or twenty colours were employed, in the Renaissance period, twenty or thirty.
“Both high warp and low warp antedated the shuttle. In other words, they use bobbins that travel only part way across instead of shuttles that travel all the way across.” The high warp loom was also in use before the treadle. “In the low warp loom the odd threads of the warp are attached to a treadle worked with the left foot, the even threads of the warp to a treadle worked with the right foot, thus making possible the manipulation of the warp with the feet and leaving both hands free to pass the bobbins. In the high warp loom, that has no treadle, the warps are manipulated with the left hand while the right hand passes the bobbins back and forth. The term high warp means that the warp is strung vertically, low warp horizontally.”
Both are woven with the wrong side toward the weaver. “The wrong side in all real tapestries is just the same as the right side except for reversal of direction and for the loose threads.... In the high warp loom, the outline of the design is traced on the warp threads with India ink from tracing paper, and the colouredcartoon hangs behind the weaver, where he consults it constantly. In the low warp loom, the coloured cartoon is usually beneath the warp, and often rolls up with the tapestry as it is completed.”[5]In the eighteenth century, the low warp loom was considered better than thehaute lisse, or high warp.
Great care has to be taken in dyeing the threads of the weft, which are much finer than those of the warp. Vegetable dyes, such as cochineal, madder, indigo, etc., must be used, for permanent colours can never be obtained with aniline dyes. The old Spanish dyes were considered the best. In this country, one sometimes gets the fine colours in an old Mexican serape or a prized Navajo blanket. The wool that is used to mend old tapestries in the American museums is coloured with dyes made by Miss Charlotte Pendleton in her workshop near Washington, which I have visited.
The Arras tapestries have a better and more attractive texture than any others. “Arras tapestries are line drawings formed by the combination of horizontal ribs with vertical weft threads and hatchings. There are no diagonal or irregular or floating threads, as in embroideries and brocades. Nor do any of the warp threads show, as in twills and damasks. The surface consists entirely of fine weft threads that completely interlace the coarser warp threads in plain weave (over and under alternately), and also completely cover them, so that only the ribs mark their position—one rib for each warp thread. Every Arras tapestry is a rep fabric, the number of ribs eight to twenty-four to the inch.” The finely woven textures are not always considered the best. “The most marvelous tapestries of the fifteenth century were comparatively coarse (from eight to twelve ribs), and of the sixteenth were moderately coarse (from ten to sixteen).”
Many of the early Gothic tapestries had inscriptions woven at the bottom or the top, but had no borders. It was not until toward the end of the fifteenth century that they began to develop these. They first had narrow verdure edgings, until Raphael introduced compartment borders in the set of the Gates of the Apostles, the most famous tapestries of the world. The most noted cartoons in existence are the designs for this set, in the Victoria and Albert Museum at South Kensington. Renaissance borders were much wider than the Gothic, and were filled with greens and flowers. At the end of theseventeenth century the borders took the form of imitation picture frames.
Gothic verdures are in reality coloured drawings in flat outline of trees and flowers with birds and animals. Renaissance verdures have more heavily shaded leaves and look more true to nature.
The majority of Gothic tapestries are anonymous as regards both maker and designer. With the Renaissance began the custom in Brussels and other Flemish cities of weaving the mark of the city into the bottom selvage, and the monogram of the weaver into the side selvage on the right. This custom was established by a city ordinance of Brussels in 1528. An edict of Charles V made it uniform, in 1544, for the whole of the Netherlands. After another century, weavers began to sign their full names or their initials in Roman letters, and monograms were discarded.
When the weavers of Arras took refuge in other countries, after the capture of that town by Louis XI, they went by thousands to England and France. In this way the French looms at Gobelins, Beauvais, and Aubusson were started, and those at Mortlake, in England.
As early as the fourteenth century, there was at least one eminent master weaver in Paris,Nicolas Bataille, in whose factory part of the remarkable Apocalypse set of the cathedral of Angers was woven. But even in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, French tapestries were far from equaling those of Flanders. In 1667, Colbert “established in the buildings of the Gobelins the furniture factory of the Crown under the direction of Charles Lebrun.”
The great establishment of “Les Gobelins,” by the way, has an interesting history. Jean and Philibert Gobelin built a dyehouse in the fifteenth century by the little stream of the Bièvre, in the Faubourg, whose waters had peculiar qualities that gave special excellence to their dyes. The family found dyeing so profitable that they were able to become bankers, and at the beginning of the seventeenth century they sold the establishment, which, however, still kept their name. Here Comans and Planche, tapestry weavers from Flanders, opened a factory in 1601. The edict of Henri Quatre by which they were incorporated gave them important privileges, but also obliged them to train apprentices and to establish the craft in the provinces.
During the Spanish occupation of the Netherlands, many tapestries were taken to Spain, where the finest in existence today are to befound. They may be seen in the churches and draping the balconies over the streets of a fête day. King Alfonso owns seven miles of gold and silver thread hangings. But these are only the remnant of what Spanish royalty formerly possessed. Charles V, Philip II, and many others of the ruling house were indefatigable collectors. The famous Conquest of Tunis, in twelve pieces, was woven by Willem de Pannemaker, the most noted of the master-weavers, for Charles V. The cartoons for this set are in the Imperial Museum in Vienna and the tapestries in the royal palace in Madrid. “Many pieces that formerly belonged to the kings of Spain have been destroyed by fire; others have been worn out by long and frequent use. For these tapestries did not remain in a fixed place: they were hung in halls and apartments on festive occasions; they were taken down and rolled up when they had done service; they were used on journeys to furnish the lodgings en route; they were packed with the campaign-baggage to garnish the tents; they decorated the jousting lists and the streets and squares when the sovereigns made their entries.”
Tapestries can also be found in Russia in palaces and museums, for Peter the Great sent for weavers from Flanders. England, too, was dependentupon the Flemings, for the noted weaver, Philip de Maecht, came from the atelier of Comans and Planche to become head of the works at Mortlake.
DIANA TAPESTRY.
DIANA TAPESTRY.
In 1376, the Court of Savoy ordered many tapestries from the great manufacturer, Nicolas Bataille, but later factories were opened in Italy. About 1455, Renard de Marncourt, another Flemish weaver, made in Rome for Pope Nicholas V the marvelous set of the Creation of the World. There were also tapestry works at Ferrara with prominent Flemings at their head. Nicholas and Jean Karcher were employed there by Duke Hercules II. Jean Roost, of Brussels, was head of a factory at Florence, in which work was continued for over two hundred years. Cardinal Francisco Barberini, after his visit to France in 1633, when he became interested in the works of Comans and Planche, started another factory in Rome. Nicholas Poussin and Pietro de Cortona supplied designs, the art director was Jean François Romanelli, and the manager Jacopo della Riviera.
Among our own tapestries, the Diana set of eight pieces came from the Barberini collection. The cartoons of these were done by du Breuil. This series possesses remarkable decorative qualities and is of great historical importance.The panels were woven in Brussels at the close of the sixteenth or the beginning of the seventeenth century, in the ateliers of Jacques Geubles and Jean Raes, who were among the most famous weavers of their time. The mark of Brussels and Brabant is woven in the bottom galon of every one of the pieces, and the monograms of the authors, that of Raes in the upper part and that of Geubles in the lower part, although it is most unusual to find all the panels signed by the artists collaborating in their production. The original linings of these tapestries bore the stamped monogram of Cardinal Francisco Barberini and also that of Cardinal Antonio Barberini. In MSS. XLVIII of Vol. 141, preserved in the Barberini library, these tapestries are mentioned as having been “presented by the most Christian King Louis XIII of France to Cardinal Barberini, Legate to France, 1625.”
Cardinal Francisco Barberini, when he visited the Court of France in 1625, went as Legate of his uncle, Pope Urban VIII, to settle upon terms of peace for Europe. These hangings then became part of the collection owned by the princely Barberini of Rome, which in time came to be renowned and was regarded as one of the most splendid in the world.
The subjects seem to be allegorical representations of the Loves of Henry of France and Diana of Poictiers, as has been agreed by some of the most important authorities who have studied them, for the faces in the tapestries show a distinct resemblance to portraits of the King and his favourite. Engravings of the heads of Henry and Diana, as can be seen in the Gazette des Beaux Arts, exhibit striking likenesses to those on the woven fabric. In the Gazette there is an illustration which shows the château of Anet, with gardens such as are represented in the tapestries, with a fountain, and Diana standing with the crescent in her hair, her bow in her hand and a quiver at her back, wearing a costume similar in style and character. Montaiglon writes of the château of Anet, that the altars were destroyed and the statues torn from their bases and carried off in pieces, as is suggested in one panel which represents a rushing river sweeping away columns and statues from their foundations. Mythology teaches that the legendary Diana punished mothers who deserted their children, and succoured their offspring, as is again suggested in this same panel of Diana of Poictiers, who did more, history relates, to bring up the children of the King than did the Queen. The beautifulMadame d’Estampes and her coterie did everything in their power to destroy Diana; pasquinades and libelous brochures were levied against her. The dragon in one panel represents jealousy, spite and vindictiveness in its flaming eyes, scaly hide and protruding tongue. Also, in allegorical manner, nothing could better express the triumph which the King accorded Diana when he “broke her enemies and humiliated them,” than the picture of the King slaying the dragon. The set is full of interesting detail—there are dogs and hares, nymphs and satyrs. All the details combine to tell the story, and in one piece the monarch wears a crown, which emphasizes the royalty of the lover.
Seven of the tapestries were originally acquired from the Princess Barberini, although inventories suggested that there were eight in the full series; strangely enough, several years later, the missing one was discovered by another collector in Amsterdam, but this had had its border cut off, as would naturally be the case in a stolen tapestry. We were able to get it, so that now the set is once more complete after hundreds of years.
The David and Goliath series is also in our possession, and is a representative set. These tapestries illustrate prominent events in thestory of David and Goliath, and were made in Flanders in the second half of the sixteenth century. They are in excellent condition, without repair, and possess borders of delicious character.
DAVID AND GOLIATH TAPESTRY.
DAVID AND GOLIATH TAPESTRY.
This set was presented by Cardinal d’Este, Papal Legate at the Court of Charles IX of France, to Count Flaminio Mannelli, who was then his secretary and had filled in various ways honourable offices at the Court and in the service of the Dowager Queen Catherine de Medici.
A record of the period shows that about 1587 the hangings were brought to Count Mannelli’s palace, in the Marche of Italy, where they remained until 1898, when we purchased them from the Marquis Pianetti of Jesi, who had come into possession of the set. The six different panels depict literally the scenes described in the Bible. The titles are: David before Saul, the Challenge of Goliath of Gath, the Battle between Goliath and David, the Beheading of Goliath, the Triumph of David, and the Madness of Saul.
When we were in Belgium, the home of tapestry, I was surprised to find comparatively few pieces there. Many more, as I have said, are seen in Italy and Spain, some in France and England, and a few in America, where we are beginning to appreciate them.
INthe Low Countries, perhaps more than in any other part of Europe, has the many-sided life of the people revealed itself through the various forms of artistic expression. Religion, industry, struggles for independence, the power of the guilds, the splendour of the dukes of Burgundy, the landscape, the homes, the people themselves, all are found in Belgian art. They were pictured in the delicate tracery of cloistered illuminators, carved in wood or stone in the old churches, enshrined within the wooden panels of ancient triptychs, and woven into the storied tapestries of hall and castle. They figured in the canvases of the Renaissance masters, and after the “Dark Ages” of the Spanish oppression, were revived in a new race of modern painters, who depicted the life of the young nation. The true greatness, the real charm of Belgium has lain in her art.
Obviously, the two great periods of Belgianart were the fifteenth and the seventeenth centuries, but it by no means follows that no other periods are worthy of our consideration; indeed, we cannot understand the school of the van Eycks without studying the three centuries preceding the fifteenth. Before the days of Hubert van Eyck there were at Bruges masters of whom he learned, and whose style can hardly be distinguished from his own. A hundred years earlier than the van Eycks was the great age of architecture, when cathedrals and mighty cloth-halls rose on Flemish plains, and sculpture, stained glass and wrought iron were all called for to decorate the wonderful structures. Still earlier, many a patient monk in his cell traced with loving care those illuminations that made the beauty of missal and breviary. The van Eycks and Memling were the lineal descendants of these artists.
Toward the fourteenth century, the exquisite vignettes of the illuminators displayed marvelous grace and delicacy of execution, cleverness of design, and great brilliancy of colour. To quote from a French writer, “In the hands of the miniature painters of Bruges, gold glistens, it sparkles. Their colours, if they are not more beautiful, are as beautiful as those of nature. Their flesh tints vie with the freshness of colourof young girls, just as in their arabesques and in their frames we think we see currants and strawberries ripening and breathe the perfume of flowers.”
At this time, painters and illuminators were in some sense rivals. They were enrolled in separate guilds at Bruges. “The Guild of St. Luke included painters, saddlers, glass-makers and mirror-makers; that of St. John illuminators, calligraphers, binders and image-painters.” Painters were allowed to use oil-colours, but illuminators were limited to water-colours. It became the aim of the former to transfer to their canvases and their wooden panels the same vividness of colouring that the latter produced upon vellum. Doubtless many artists were at work at this problem, which was finally solved by Hubert van Eyck.
Another important factor in forming the Flemish school was the influence of the guilds. In the fourteenth century, the painter was a craftsman and as rigidly bound by the laws of his guild as any carpenter or mason. He was apprenticed to a master for perhaps five years, during which he was taught the secrets of the craft. He learned to choose the wood for his panel and make it ready for use. He mixed the fine plaster with which to cover the wood, andthe durability of his picture depended on the care he used in this and the evenness of the coating. For every implement with which he worked, every colour that entered into his picture, he must depend upon himself. He must prepare his own oils and varnishes. If he wished to make a drawing, he often was obliged to work with the silver-point, and to prepare his paper himself; if he drew in chalk or charcoal, he had to make his own selection of materials.
After the apprenticeship came the years of wandering, when the young painter could work for any master he pleased, could travel as far afield as he chose, and in this way gain experience and a store of valuable impressions. When he returned to his home, he was admitted to the painters’ guild, provided he could satisfy its officers that he was competent; if so, he could take his position as a master of the craft. Even then he was not free from the supervision of the fraternity. His master’s oath bound him to honesty and to do his work “as in the sight of God.” Its officers inspected his materials and his output, and if either was found to be below the standard he was punished. Every contract must be fulfilled to the letter, and the guild officers were the arbiters in case of any dispute.Finally, all his implements were marked with the sign of the guild.
Pictures of the cities of Flanders in the fifteenth century bear witness to their artistic splendour. Says an English writer of Bruges at that time, “The squares were adorned with fountains; its bridges with statues in bronze; the public buildings and many of the private houses with statuary and carved work, the beauty of which was heightened and brought out by gilding and polychrome; the windows were rich with storied glass, and the walls of the interiors adorned with paintings in distemper, or hung with gorgeous tapestry.” It was in surroundings such as these and under the stimulus of competition with his brother craftsmen that Hubert van Eyck made his great discovery of a manner of using oil in painting large pieces that would make it possible to equal the brilliant colours of the illuminators. The Flemings kept the secret of the new process so well that it was not disclosed to Italian artists until toward the end of the fifteenth century.
But this discovery in technique is not his only claim to renown. His achievements as a painter were even greater than his skill as a craftsman. A high authority says that the beauty of the Virgin in the Adoration of the Lamb “places itin the rank of the Madonnas of Leonardo da Vinci and of Raphael.” This genius of the Middle Ages and his younger brother have left Belgium in the famous triptych a lofty composition in which the marvelous technique that has wrought the colours together till the surface is like enamel is combined with beauty of landscape and skill in portraiture. In the inscription placed upon it we read: “Hubert van Eyck, than whom none greater has appeared, began the work, which Jan his brother, in art the second, brought to completion.”
Almost nothing is known of the life of Hubert van Eyck. He was born at Maaseyck about the year 1366, and lived at Bruges with his brother and their sister Margaret, who was also a painter. He was made a member of the painters’ guild of Ghent in 1421, the year in which he left the service of the powerful lord afterward known as Philip the Good. Three years later, Jodocus Vydts, burgomaster of Ghent, and his wife Isabella gave him an order for an altar-piece to be placed in their mortuary chapel in the cathedral. His work was cut short by his death in 1426. It is impossible to tell how much was done by his hand and how much by his brother Jan, but there seems good reason to believe that Hubert painted the central panels inthe upper row, and that Jan was the artist of the Adoration panel below these. Through some strange lack of appreciation in the custodians of this masterpiece, Brussels and Berlin were able to purchase the wings, so that those we saw at Ghent were only copies.
Hubert van Eyck’s body was laid in the chapel of the Vydts’ in the cathedral of St. Bavon, near his masterpiece, but we are told that his severed right arm was placed in a reliquary in the cathedral itself. No doubt it was considered a sacred relic! His epitaph was carved on a shield, supported by a marble skeleton. The following free translation of this quaint old Flemish verse was made by William B. Scott:[6]