International studio (50.1913)

Tapestries in American Museums

example of a rare type, and in the right selvage
bears an unusual mark, a full-size high-warp
pointed bobbin (broche) in yellow outlined with
red. Certainly this tapestry was woven on a
high-warp loom, perhaps in Paris at the end of
the sixteenth century. A Late Renaissance tap-
estry (much faded), n feet 2 by 15 feet 3, the gift
of Miss C. L. W. French, has the panel taken up
principally with eight fluted columns, carrying an
arbor, and is signed with the Brussels mark and
with a monogram made up of the letters C S T.
There is a tapestry from the same design in the
Fine Arts Building at Yale University. Two
Story of Achilles tapestries, dating from the middle
of the seventeenth century, lent by Mr. George
R. White, will be illustrated and described by me
in a later number of The International Studio.
The Goddess of Victory belonging to the Museum
was designed by the Antwerp painter, L. Van
Schoor (1666-1726), as his signature in the panel
shows, and brings to mind a number of other
tapestries designed by him and woven in Brussels
near the end of the seventeenth century.
The most interesting set of seventeenth-century
tapestries with which I am acquainted is the Story
of Diana, in six pieces, lent by Mr. J. Pierpont
Morgan to the Morgan Memorial in Hartford. It
is quite as rich in gold and silver as Mr. Blumen-
thal’s two Early Renaissance Mercury and Herse
tapestries formerly at the Metropolitan Museum,
one of which is illustrated in color in my book, and
is a masterpiece of the weaver’s art, having come
from the low warp looms established in Paris at
the beginning of the seventeenth century by
Comans and Planche, two experts summoned from
Flanders by Henri IV. All the tapestries are
signed with the Paris mark, a P with fleur-de-lis,
and with the monograms of FM and TH, except
one, that has FM and AM. I regret that space
does not allow me to describe fully this beautiful
set, one of which, the Pursuit of Britomart, is illus-
trated on page lxix. There are complete sets of the
eight pieces designed by Toussaint Dubreuil in the
French National Collection, and in the Imperial
Austrian Collection. The Morgan set and the set
in the Royal Spanish Collection have different
borders from the French and Austrian sets, and
from each other, and from still another set in the
United States. All five sets bear the Paris mark
and the signatures of early seventeenth-century
Paris weavers, the fifth set mentioned being
signed with the monogram of FVDP (otherwise
Frans Van Der Planken, called Planche in French)
one of the promoters, and several of the Spanish

set that of PDM, otherwise Philip de Maecht, who
afterwards went to England, where he became
head of the Mortlake tapestry works.
Important but much less interesting and valu-
able tapestries, also lent to the Hartford Museum
by Mr. Morgan, are three from the Story of
Phaethon, the remaining five of the set still hanging
in the hall of his late father’s residence in New
York City. All are signed with the Brussels mark
and with the spelled-out name of Jan Leyniers,
who died in 1686.
In the Chicago Art Institute are three tapestries
presented by Mr. Charles J. Singer, which the label
describes as “signed with the monogram of Jan
Van Leefdael.” As a matter of fact, none of the
three bears his monogram, and the outer two differ
greatly from the middle one in weave and in style.
The middle one is signed with the Brussels mark
and with the spelled-out name (not the mono-
gram) of I. V. LEEFDAEL, whose signature also
appears on part of the Antony and Cleopatra series
at the Metropolitan Museum. The tapestry also
resembles the Antony and Cleopatra series in hav-
ing a tiny landscape woven into the middle of the
bottom border, and in style of design bears a close
resemblance to the two Achilles tapestries after
Rubens lent by Mr. White to the Boston Museum.
The two outer Singer tapestries are tall and nar-
row (entrefentires'), each about 13 feet 6 by 6 feet,
and in style of design and weave suggest the
Artemisia tapestries, woven at Paris in the early
part of the seventeenth century. Indeed, I should
not be surprised to learn that the designs of these
two panels were taken from the Artemisia set.
The top and bottom borders suggest borders
woven at Paris on tapestries designed by Simon
Vouet. But there is no Paris mark in the bottom
selvage or familiar monogram in the right selvage,
as in the Diana tapestries described earlier. In-
stead, in the right border a flower above a mono-
gram that I cannot decipher.
On the wall facing these three tapestries are two
Late Renaissance, ones, about n feet 3 by
12 feet 8, and 8 feet 5, respectively. The smaller
is signed with the monogram that was the joint
trademark of Jan Raes and of Jacques Geubels,
who flourished in Brussels at the beginning of the
seventeenth century. The larger of the two tap-
estries, undoubtedly from the same shop, has lost
its original signature, but in the bottom selvage
that is modern, has DP put in, evidently in a
humorous spirit, by the repairer. Both tapestries
have wide, rich borders (the same) and panels well
filled with Renaissance hunting-scene design.

LXXII