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A tapestry is a type of woven fabric in which weft threads are used to create a design through warp threads, creating a
decorative design within the hanging itself. In genuine tapestry, the design is an integral part of the cloth. Some early
“tapestries” like the famous Bayeux tapestry of Queen Matilda, are actually embroidered hangings, the design sewn over
the cloth rather than being part of it. As weaving became more complex, tapestries increased in popularity throughout the
late Middle Ages, or Gothic period, and into the Renaissance, not only for their decorative properties, but also as a
useful furnishing item in drafty manors and castles.
Because they were intended to be part of the furnishings, tapestries were usually commissioned to fit a particular space.
These tapestries were then woven by hand on special looms of either vertical warp (high warp tapestry) or horizontal warp
(low warp tapestry). Before the 17th century, most tapestry was high warp. From the 17th century on, however, most
tapestry was low warp, which could be made a bit more quickly, with a corresponding loss of quality.
In high warp weaving, the loom consisted of two wooden rollers installed horizontally on two uprights; the warp thread was
then wound over and fixed to the rollers. In the best tapestries, the warp strings ranged from 16 to 23 per inch. Once the
preparation of the initial warp threads was complete, the weaver used tracing paper to transfer the outline of the design,
or cartoon (as the drawing for the design on the tapestry was known) onto the warp threads. The cartoon itself remained
behind the weaver who used mirrors to check his progress in matching the tapestry to it. The weaver used a bobbin to create
the weft, moving through the warp threads first left to right, then back right to left, and beating down each of these
double passes (known as a duite) with either the pointed end of the bobbin or an ivory comb.
In low warp weaving, the tapestry was done on horizontal looms with two weaving slats, all eve warp threads connected to the
first slat, all uneven to the second. Each slat was moved by a foot pedal. The weaver transferred the outline of the cartoon
in reverse because this weaving was done from the back side of the tapestry. He used a mirror placed between the tracing and
the warp to follow his execution of the work. Facing the light, he bent over the loom and used both hands, the right passing
the shuttle from left to right while he followed with the left hand using a needle or comb to push the thread into place.
After one passage through the warp threads, he used the pedal to pull the other slat forward and repeated the process on the
uneven-numbered threads.
Because of the size of the pieces, several weavers could work simultaneously on the same piece. Indeed, most of the weavers
were divided into specialties; those who, for instance, specialized in flesh and faces, which was considered more delicate
work, were paid more than weavers who specialized in landscape or borders. Through close and continual application, a good
weaver might be able to create a square foot of tapestry in a week. More generally, according to how complex the cartoon, a
weaver could complete a to 6 square yards of tapestry per year.
There were three very important figures in the creation of any Renaissance tapestry. The first was the person who commissioned
the work. This was usually a member of the nobility since tapestries were very expensive. This patron specified the size and
subject matter of the tapestry, most of them calling for either religious or historical scenes. The patron usually hired the
cartoonist, the artist who created the design for the tapestry first. These cartoons were completely colored and rendered
drawings that constituted significant art works in their own right. Usually, the artist then subcontracted the work to the
weaver, the best of whom were from Brussels. For example, in the early 16th century, Pope Leo X commissioned Raphael to do
a series of 10 tapestries based on the Acts of the Apostles. Raphael completed these designs (probably aided by Giulio Romano)
in December of 1516 and sent them off to Pieter van Aelst, a master weaver in Brussels. Three years later, just in time for
Christmas, 7 of the 10 were delivered to the pope in Rome, each tapestry approximately 15 feet high and 42 feet long. Work
had gone a little faster than usual, taking only three years, because the weavers had used the low warp method. The pope paid
the equivalent of $130,000 in 1515 currency, which would easily be more than ten times that at today’s rate of exchange.
In 1548, Emperor Charles V commissioned one of the best of the Brussels weavers, Wilhelm de Pannemaker to do a series of 12
tapestries based on the emperor’s campaign against the city of Tunis. The court painter Jean Cornelisz Vermeyen had accompanied
the emperor on the campaign and designed the cartoons based on his own observations. In order to fulfill the commission,
Pannemaker hired 7 workmen to weave without intermission on each tapestry, 84 workmen in all. They completed the work in a
little over 5 years, delivering it in 1554. It had required close to 600 pounds of silk alone (not counting the wool and
metallic thread) and represented close to 4,000 square feet of tapestry.
Some patrons even established their own workshops in order to have easy access to the production of tapestries. In 1510,
Francois I of France established a workshop at Fontainebleau. He hired two well-known Flemish weavers to head it, requiring
them to set up 24 looms and hire their own apprentices accordingly. The workshop continued to function until the middle of
the 16th century, despite Francois’s own demise.
During this time, the tapestries currently on display at the R.W. Norton Art Gallery were created. Apparently originally
commissioned (or at least later purchased) by Francois I, the cartoons were designed by Giulio Romano, a follower of Raphael
who, after leaving Rome for Mantua, had quickly become one of the most in-demand tapestry designers in Europe. The tapestries
were based on Plutarch’s epic, Africa, and depicted episodes in the life of Scipio Africanus, the great Roman general who
defeated Hannibal, leading general of the city-state of Carthage. In contrast to the strict neo-classicism usually displayed
by Raphael, Romano was more baroque, filling his designs with movement, crowding in accessory figures, and using complicated
foreshortening and luxurious detail. Once the initial sketches were approved by Francois I (several of them are in the Louvre
today), they were sent to Brussels to be woven into tapestries by the workshop of Marc Cretif, a process which took approximately
five years.
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