International studio (52.1914)

The Brooklyn Tapestry Exhibition


THE HAINAUER CRUCIFIXION, WITH PAINTINGS ON EITHER SIDE

said to be in the Detroit Museum under an incor-
rect title; next to it a delightful Renaissance Proces-
sion of Bacchus, in fascinating golden yellows; next
to that a Renaissance Naval Battle, of considerable
meiit as regards both design and colour, and in the
middle of the left wall of the Main Room, the two
immense masterpieces, the Prophecy of Nathan,
and the Triumph of David, the former late Gothic,
ii feet io by 21 feet 5, the latter early Renais-
sance, 13 feet 10 by 20 feet 3.
The main scene of the latter shows David as a
small boy, proudly staggering along beneath the
weight of the head of Goliath, borne on the giant’s
own sword, while King Saul, richly clad, fol-
lows upon a splendidly caparisoned horse. The
main scene of the former shows Nathan in the
foreground declaring to the penitent David, who
stands at the throne with Bathsheba by his side,
that “The sword shall never depart from thine
house; because thou hast despised me and hast
taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife.”
The most interesting tapestry in the entrance
corridor was the Early Gobelin, at the extreme
end, picturing the Death of the Children of Niobe at
the Hands of Apollo and Diana, where the mother
Latona had been insulted by Niobe. It is rich
with gold and of the famous Diana series, of which
there are partial sets in the French National, the
Royal Spanish, the Imperial Austrian collections,
and in the Morgan Memorial Museum at Hartford.
The gem of the exhibition was one of the small-

est of the fifty-three tapestries shown, the Hain-
auer Crucifixion, 6 feet 8 by 9 feet 4, composed
with extraordinary skill of wool, gold, silver and
silk. Without confusion it presents not one scene
but four, from left to right: First, Christ being
roughly driven along the road to Calvary; sec-
ond, Christ on the Cross, with the thieves beside
him; third, the Deposition; fourth, the Entomb-
ment. The texture of this tapestry is extraordi-
nary, the line effects of horizontal ribs and verti-
cal weft threads and hatchings being skilfully
employed to secure by line contrast results
impossible with paint. The contrast between its
texture and that of paintings was accentuated by
its being the only tapestry in a room where all the
other pictures were paintings. It was hardly nec-
essary to point out even to the novice that the
paintings forced their shadows violently in the
direction of blackness, and away from decorative
beauty, while the tapestry went far in the opposite
direction, and yet told all its story clearly, with a
multitude of personages and infinite detail.
Not that I wish to claim for tapestry pre-
eminence over painting, or, indeed, over any of
the other arts. I regard the arts as equal, each
being raised above the others only in proportion
to the degree of perfection with which its works
are executed. But I do demand for what is the
most delightful of all the arts, to me personally, the
opportunity to be judged by tapestry standards
and not by those of painting or architecture.

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