Exploring early Europeantapestries and their relevance to

contemporary practice

Copyright © 2018 by Chrissie Freeth. The moral right of the author has been asserted.

The views and opinions expressed in this report and its content are those of the author and not of the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust, which has no responsibility or liability for any partof the report.

Front cover: Apocalypse of Angers, Châteaux d’Angers, Angers, France. Back cover: Saint Lucia, Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich, Germany.

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Contents

Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 3Biography………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 3

1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…. 42. The Abraham Tapestry, Harzvorland, 1150/1170…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…. 73. Medallion Altar Front, Switzerland, 1300 ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….….. 164. The Apocalypse of Angers, Paris, 1382………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……. 215. The Falcon’s Bath, South Netherlands, 1400-1415……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……. 276. The Betrothal of St. Catherine, the Last Supper, Nuremberg, 1450………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..…………………… 377. The Woodworkers, Tournai, 1460………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 438. Scene from The Buzzard, Upper Rhine, 1480………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…..……… 489. Justice disarmed by Mercy, Brussels, 1510………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..………………………………...……..…………………………….…...… 5410. The Holy Land, Rome, 1644-1656……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……………………………………...….… 6111. Conclusions…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…………………………….……….… 6612. Recommendations and Future Work…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….………………………….………….….. 69

AppendicesCrib Sheet……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…………… 71Itinerary………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…………… 72Tapestries Studied…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….………… 73Glossary………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…………… 77

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Acknowledgements

A great deal of help was received in the planning and application of the project both at itsinception and once it was up and running, thus thanks go to Janet Austin, Kelley BevinButler, Geraldine Froment, Andie Harris, Heidi Heimers, Rob Janaway, Dr Sonia O’Connor,Nicolas Prinet, Liz Samways, Olivia Stross, Lesley Thorndyke. Grateful thanks are alsorendered to everyone who met or corresponded with me over the course of the Fellowship- Dr Ingrid de Meuter (Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique), Béatrice deChancel-Bardelot (Musée National du Moyen Âge), Clementine Mathurin and CatherineLeroi from the Centre des Monuments Nationaux and the stewards of the MuséeJean-Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine who made me feel incredibly welcome.Martine Plait and Michele Le Ru from the Liciers Angevin and especially to Christine PradelLien for welcoming me into her home and for showing me her studio. Christina Carr andKisook Shu at the Met for facilitating access to tapestries in storage, showing me thelaboratories and their research and inviting me to join them for a seminar. Conservator LigiaFernandez and Anna Szalecki who so kindly showed me around the Barberini Exhibition.Simona Blau (Vojtech Blau), Susan Brown (Cooper Hewit), Erin Riley, Archie Brennan andSusan Martin Maffei, Claudia Wyludda (Halberstadt Domschatz), Dr Adelheid Rasche(Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg), Susan Marti (Bernisches HistorischesMuseum, Berne), Dr Margret Ribbert (Historisches Museum Basel). And of course heartfelt

thanks go to the folk at the WCMT who made this amazing experience possible. And finallyto my late grandparents Dorothy and Richard. I don’t know what they would make of theunexpected turns in my career, but I know it would be impossible without the opportunitiesthey gave me.

Biography

I am a full-time tapestry weaver based in Yorkshire and regularly exhibit my work.Previously I was an academic archaeologist and have a PhD in biocultural anthropologyalthough I had been interested in historical textiles for twenty years and first learned toweave on a warp-weighted loom as an undergraduate. I can be found in the the CraftsCouncil's prestigious Directory of British craftworkers and I am a trustee of the HeritageCrafts Association. During 2014 I was Artist in Residence for the National Trust, basedat East Riddlesden Hall. Previously I was a features writer for UK Handmade magazine andweaving features editor for the Journal for Weavers, Spinners and Dyers, and a full Memberof the Society of Designer Craftsmen.

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Introduction

Background

As a tapestry weaver who was once an archaeologist, itwas inevitable I would be interested in early tapestries.Although I studied them through online museumcollections and the few historical texts available, whenvisiting the V&A I came to realise how different anexperience it was seeing the tapestries in the flesh. Imagesin books and websites, where several feet or metres oftextiles are reduced to mere centimetres, cannot conveythe depth, the skill, and the energy of the tapestries.

Although I had been weaving for a few years by then, Irealised it would be impossible for me to call myself aweaver without studying tapestries first-hand. I needed tostudy how these weavers laid down their thread, to seewhat they did and why, to explore the decisions they made,the techniques they used, the choices they had to make.Without doing so I was trying to be an aeronauticalengineer having never seen a plane, my work would alwaysbe without technical understanding, there would be a lackof depth and context. With few collections in the UK (theV&A and Burrell Collections being notable exceptions) andmost texts focusing on who owned or designed tapestriesrather than how they were woven, and with littlesubstantial training available in the UK, I knew the chanceswere I would not be the only one.

Tapestries were once the ultimate bling of early historicalEurope. They were the most valuable thing owned by theEnglish state, the cost equivalent of battle ships, they werecelebrated as war booty, they were the propaganda ofchoice of both church and state. But inevitably theyeventually fell foul of reformation and revolution, both ofpolitics and fashion. They were burned for their gold thread,

they were cut up and used to insulate flower beds. Theirplace on walls taken over by wooden panelling andwallpaper. The major manufactories resorted to tweereproductions of paintings, and bits and pieces forfurniture coverings.

It wasn’t until the mid-twentieth century and the work ofJean Lurçat that the revival of tapestry as an art form tookplace. Lurçat, inspired by the fourteenth centuryApocalypse of Angers, argued that following theRenaissance tapestries sought to imitate paintings, thatprior to then tapestry was a medium in its own right andwith its own intrinsic qualities. It was these qualities inparticular and the work of those weavers that I wanted tounderstand.

By enabling me to visit major collections in Europe and theUS, my WCMT Fellowship offered me the chance to studytapestry techniques first-hand, and to study those qualitiesLurçat identified as being essential to the medium. Morespecifically the aims of my Fellowship were to:

study the design, scale, construction and techniquesused in pre-Renaissance tapestries, for this to feedinto my own practice and understanding and todisseminate this to weavers and non-practitioners

determine how the nature and craftsmanship of theseearly tapestries were translated into those associatedwith the early twentieth century revival of tapestry,and again for this to feed into my own practice and tobe disseminated to others

examine the relationship of early tapestries and therevival they inspired to contemporary practice and to

better understand the implications of this to thehealth and future of the craft in the UK

Methodology

Initial desk-based research identified numerous potentialcollections, studios and practitioners to visit across Europeand the US, and it took time to hone it into an itinerary thatwould provide me with a breadth of tapestries fromdifferent periods and geographical areas and which offeredcollections large enough to justify the visit and which wereclustered enough to be practically and physically possiblefrom a travelling point of view. It was intended toundertake the project in one go, but due to unexpectedpersonal reasons this proved impractical and I am gratefulto the WCMT for being so flexible on this account. Itactually proved to be rather useful as attempts to put intopractice what I had seen between trips furnished me withexperience and questions ready for the next.

Initially I planned to spend four weeks in Europe and afortnight in the US; I wanted to use my time in the States inparticular to engage with contemporary practitioners andwas especially looking forward to meeting Archie Brennanand Susan Martin Maffei, but it became apparent as myresearch continued that I needed more time in Europe andso with much regret I had to reduce my time to a week inthe US. I also had to drop Tournai, Reims and Aubussonfrom my itinerary to bring the first leg into the budgetallocated. Although this was frustrating at the time,especially as it was at Aubusson I had hoped to meet withpractitioners, it did mean funds were available later on inthe project to travel to Germany which was not initiallypart of my plan.

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I had been aware that the earliest substantial westerntapestries were housed at Halberstadt Cathedral, but it wasa difficult detour to justify for three tapestries. Howeverwhilst in France I became conscious of the importance ofseeing the Nuremburg and Munich collections and onseeing the Apocalypse tapestries in Angers it becameimperative to see the earlier pieces in order to betterunderstand how the skills behind the Apocalypse seeminglyappeared out of nowhere. The advice from WCMT that wewould need to be flexible in our plans, especially once onthe ground, was incredibly sound, and I am very grateful tothe WCMT for their incessant patience regarding myitinerary.

In short the project focused on the Musées Royaux desBeaux-Arts de Belgique in Brussels, the Louvre, the MuséeNational du Moyen Âge (formerly the Cluny), Musée desArts Décoratifs and the Gobelins Manufactory in Paris, theApocalypse at the Châteaux d’Angers, the MuséeJean-Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine and aworkshop of weavers in Angers, the Cloisters and theMetropolitan Museum of Art (the Met) and several privategalleries in New York, the cathedral treasuries atHalberstadt and Quedlinburg, the GermanischesNationalmuseum in Nuremberg, the BayerischesNationalmuseum in Munich, the Bernisches HistorischesMuseum in Bern, the castle at Thun and the HistorischesMuseum in Basel. A full itinerary can be found in theappendix. It was often an overwhelming experience,especially in my first days. Initially I had not scheduled restdays or time to reflect on what was being observed.However it quickly became apparent that these would beessential. I tried to coincide these days, as well as internaltravel, when the galleries were closed. Evenings were spenttyping up notes and sorting images.

It was never the intention of the project to simply cram inas many medieval tapestries as I could, whizzing past themas I ticked them off a list. I needed to be able to take mytime to have the most constructive conversations I could

with my weaving predecessors. To this end much time wasspent prior to the project determining how I could bestengage with them. With retrospect I feel my background asan archaeologist may have served me well; I am used toapproaching objects and trying to extract as muchinformation as possible, whether that is a textile, a bone orpiece of ceramic.

From the outset I intended to only see tapestries that wereon display, examining tapestries in storage is a big ask andnot necessarily practical for a project like this (although Iwas given such access on several occasions). This meantthere would be limitations; from a technical point of viewtapestries are best read from the back, the weavers side,and of course they are generally displayed facing the frontand hanging in the opposite way to which they were woven(on the side). I was also conscious there would belimitations on how close I could get and that there wouldbe difficulties caused by limited lighting and with the heightat which they were hung.

Bearing this in mind, I assumed the usefulness ofphotography would be limited, especially without a flash,and so intended to make copious sketches and notesinstead. However it quickly became apparent that mymisgivings were entirely unfounded and whilst there wereoccasions where tapestries were kept in near blackness orbehind barriers or furniture or so high up on a wall theycould not be studied closely, in general access was verygood. In some instances, especially in Germany thetapestries were kept behind glass and although this meantclose access was possible there were often issues withreflection from spot lights or nearby windows. It was arelief and also a sadness that crowds of other visitors werenot a problem. Often these were the most empty galleries,and it was sometimes frustrating to see people walk in andthen almost immediately walk out again, seeminglyunaware of the treasures before them. Sensitivity of alarmsvaried from place to place and I am grateful for thetolerance of gallery staff when I would accidentally set

them off. They were particularly sensitive in theHistorisches Museum at Basel and I am exceedinglygrateful that to circumnavigate this I was given accessbefore the gallery opened to the public and the alarmswere disabled and light provided so I could study andphotograph the tapestries in tremendous detail. Therewere instances where photography was strictly forbiddenand I am grateful for when permission was given to takephotographs nonetheless. Prior to the trip I had intendedto use a digital SLR camera, but experiments suggested myiPad would be just as effective, it also had the advantage ofenabling quick uploading to the cloud, keeping the imagessecure. I was untrusting of SD cards due to previousexperience and would not risk the loss. The only draw backwith the iPad, especially in dark interior conditions, wasthat it was more effective in close ups rather thancapturing the tapestry as a whole. But this was a smallcompromise, especially when more general images aremore readily available elsewhere. An archive of thousandsof photographs were taken and it has already proved aninvaluable resource to refer to. A full list of the tapestriesstudied can be found in the appendix. For consistency’ssake I have attempted to translate the titles of the historictapestries into English.

I generally had an idea of what tapestries were on displayprior to my arrival, but not always. I generally took stock ofthe room or galleries to assess what was where and whatmy focus should be. It would have been easy to getsidetracked by tapestries not strictly relevant to the aimsand objectives of the project. Naturally I also focused myattentions on those that were the most accessible. After aninitial assessment of a tapestry, taking in the overall nature,content and design, I would end up undertaking a bit of asmash and grab of elements of the tapestry that appealeduntil a calmer approach took over. I would stand with myside facing the tapestry with my head cocked to get aweaver’s view and slowly and methodically walk backwardstaking in as much detail as I could, up and down, identifying

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the techniques in use, and how the weaver had done whatI was seeing. I’m sure I must have looked rather ridiculousto security guards and other visitors. I would generallyspend several hours with a tapestry. Prior to the first trip Icreated a crib sheet for reference, and it was useful to haveit to hand, to keep me focused and to remind myself whatit was I was doing, especially when feeling overwhelmed bythe bounty before me. The crib sheets are reproduced inthe appendix. I also kept in mind more generic questionssuch as, What is my response to this tapestry? What wouldI ask its weavers if I could? What do I want to take from itas a weaver? How does it compare to other tapestries Ihave seen? These and other questions were kept in aseparate notebook for each trip.

Establishing how best to share this experience in thisreport proved difficult. A museum by museum account wasdull and a thematic approach failed to convey the breadthof the tapestries due to the focus on minutiae. For example,by focusing on technique the tapestries became somewhatdisembodied. Instead I have focused on a selection oftapestries which hopefully illustrate the variety of thosestudied and which provide the opportunity to explore thewider themes and findings and a more comprehensiveoverview of the Fellowship. In so doing I have tried to avoid

tapestries that are already well known and explored indetail elsewhere and instead have focused on those less inthe limelight. Inevitably only a fraction of the tapestriesstudied can be included in a report of this size, but it ishoped enough are included to give a flavour of what anexperience this has been. These tapestries have beenpresented chronologically, but in no way is this meant toimply any sense of progression in the themes discussed.

The focus of this report is very much that of a fellowweaver, my observations of how varying techniques wereused. It does not pretend to be an art-historical discourseor a place to explore, for example, the stylistic differencesbetween workshops or the content of the tapestries. Thereare plenty of sources elsewhere for this approach. Also,alas, my report does not touch upon the materials used inthese tapestries, that would require a level of access, timeand expertise I do not possess. It is worth acknowledginghere that although my Fellowship was about the work ofthe weavers, behind every one of them would have been ateam of dyers, behind each of them a legion of handspinners and behind them an army of carders and woolproducers and processors.

The report has been written for readers who have noexperience of tapestry, and although terms are explainedin the course of the narrative, there is also a glossary in theappendix.

Having discussed here in Chapter 1 what led to the projectand how it was executed, we will go on to explore howtapestries are woven including slits, dovetailing and howthey are hung (Chapter 2), over sewing and raised surfaces(Chapter 3), the theories of Lurçat (Chapter 4), millefleur,chiné, and contoured wefts (Chapter 5), demi duite andguimpage (Chapter 6), ‘excavating’ tapestries (Chapter 7),cartoons (Chapter 8), hachure, hatching, chequerboard andrayure (Chapter 9), and public engagement, practice andconservation (Chapter 10). These themes will be pulledtogether to draw some conclusions (Chapter 11) andthoughts as to future work (Chapter 12).

Inevitably this report is image focused but they have had tobe compressed for the sake of file size and which mayaffect quality. Each image is numbered and referenced inthe text in brackets (not always in order alas, as the needsof formatting often dictated otherwise). A thumbnail of thelarger image from which a close-up was taken has beenincluded when it was thought some context was needed.

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The Abraham Tapestry, Harzvorland, 1150/1170Domschatz, Halberstadt, Germany

The most famous tapestry in the world isn’t a tapestry, it’san embroidery, but the fame of the length of linendepicting the Norman conquest is unlikely to relinquish itsmisnomer any time soon. There are famous propertapestries of course, most will be aware of The Lady andthe Unicorn cycle, thanks to decades of National Trustmerchandise or even Tracy Chevalier’s fictionalised accountof its making. The Hunt of the Unicorn tapestries in NewYork may even be familiar to some, especially to those whohave visited their recently finished reconstructions atStirling Castle. The monumental awe inspiring Apocalypseof Angers may even be known, although in the UK, Iconcede I may be pushing it. These are rightly celebratedphenomenal achievements, but there is a set ofRomanesque tapestries in a small town in Germany thatdeserve to be celebrated as much as their more famouscousins and even its near contemporary the Bayeauxtapestry.

Cathedrals amassed great wealth and treasures -jewel-decked manuscripts, sculpture, caskets for relics,candlesticks, glass, vestments, textiles and tapestries. Timeand reformation has seen such treasuries dispersed, butdespite the centuries, a world war hidden in a cave, and astint in the communist Eastern Bloc, the treasury of

Halberstadt Cathedral remains astonishingly intact. TheDomschatz museum which curates the treasury includestwo early sixteenth century tapestries depicting the life ofMary woven in the Rhineland, Charlemagne among theFour Philosophers of Antiquity woven around 1200 and twowoven around 1150/1170, The Apostle Tapestry and TheAbraham Tapestry, both woven, like Charlemagne, inHarzvorland. A third tapestry similar to the Abraham andApostle tapestries formed a U-shape and hung in theCathedral choir. Alas it is has since gone missing, althoughrecently enough for pictures of it to survive.

There are earlier tapestries in the museums of the west,small pieces attached to the clothing of Egyptian Copts,preserved in the dry burial environments and nowdistributed across museums of the world. There arewonderfully named fragments like The Cloth of Gunther orThe Cloth of Gereon, the latter helpfully cut into smallpieces during the nineteenth century so numerousmuseums could have a piece. There are even earlyfragments dating to the Viking era, but those hanging inthe Domschatz museum are the earliest substantial intactEuropean woven tapestries in existence.

Unlike the Bayeaux tapestry, where the design is applied toa pre-existing fabric, tapestries are woven on a loom, theimage an integral part of the cloth, created at the sametime and thus perhaps more akin to a sculpture than anembroidery.

Tapestries are made up of warp and weft. The loom keepsthe warp threads under tension so the weaver can add theweft that forms the design. An easy way to rememberone’s warp from one’s weft, is that the p points down andthe t points across. You’ll want to remember that bit as wego on.

The cloth you are likely to be wearing as you read this willbe made up of a criss-cross of these warp and weft threads,they play an equal part. But in tapestry the weft completelycovers the warp, which becomes the hidden skeleton ofthe tapestry. Technically tapestries are known as aweft-faced weave. Only the weft is seen.

There are two types of loom, horizontal and vertical, alsoknown as basse lisse and haute lisse respectively. Althoughsome areas favoured different types, there is no real way

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to tell from the tapestry which was used to weave it.

Pictured overleaf (12) is a basse lisse loom on display inAngers. The warp runs from beam to beam in front of anintegral bench for the weaver. The weft is usually on abobbin and this is used to guide the weft in and out of thewarps. Bobbins are different shapes depending on theloom. Below are those used with horizontal looms as partof a display of the Barberini tapestries in New York (7).Bobbins used with upright looms have a pointed shaft usedto help beat down the thread. Looms have a mechanismthat separates every other warp thread and this eases thepassage of the bobbin. In the basse lisse loom pictured,treadles operated by the weaver’s feet are attached toalternate warps, pulling them down.

Tapestries are woven on their side as they hang better andhave a better chance against gravity when the warpthreads run side to side when hung. When looking at atapestry on a wall it is not how the weaver would haveseen it, and they usually wove them from the back as well.The covered warps form a ridge in the fabric, known as arib, and by assessing their orientation it is possible to workout the direction the tapestry was woven. Unusually in theCharlemagne tapestry in Halberstadt the warps run fromtop to bottom, meaning it was woven the right way up, theonly historical tapestry I saw woven this way (8).

Nothing prepares you for walking into these galleries andseeing the tapestries for the first time, the centuries oldfigures and shapes looming out of the darkness as youreyes adjust to the light. Stepping into the galleries that heldThe Lady and the Unicorn cycle, the Basel tapestries andthe Apocalypse of Angers will always stay with me, butespecially so seeing the Halberstadt tapestries for the firsttime.

I was first struck by the stateliness of the figures and thenby the colours which have been astoundingly wellpreserved. The palette is limited to around seven colours

and the background is left plain creating an overwhelmingsense of harmony and balance.

The Abraham Tapestry is long and relatively narrow (122cmx 1026cm) and the warps run from left to right and so itwas woven on its side. The loom was wide enough for oneor two weavers. And because of the length of the tapestrythe loom must have had beams which held the unusedwarp and the finished work.

The tapestry is divided into three scenes: angels visitAbraham and are served by Sarah, Abraham is ordered tosacrifice Isaac but a ram is sent instead, and Saint Michaelslays a dragon. There are also fragments of a geometricborder although most of it was cut away in antiquity. Thetapestry has two narratives, most obviously Abraham onone-hand, but there are also suggestions of the last supperin the angels feasting and in the Passion with Isaac carryingthe logs; it was obviously intended for an educatedaudience. The figures are not proportional; the legs areshort, the hands oversized, the fingers elongated and thefaces are stylised and there is no attempt at modelling thefeatures or drapery realistically (1-5). Distinct circles ordoughnut shapes form the cheeks, the lips are bat shaped,the heavily rendered eyes in green and brown feed into thenose.

Unlike the weaving of cloth where a shuttle travels acrossthe full width of the warp, in tapestry discrete areas ofcolour are created thus building up the design. Wherethese areas of colour meet slits inevitably form betweenthe warps. As in a thirteenth century Spanish tapestryknown as The Beautiful Ladies, or The Drinking Ladies, ifthe slits are small enough they can be left and help createdefined shapes (9). But if the slits are of any size, over timethe weight of the tapestry will pull the slits apart. Toprevent this weavers often sewed them together duringthe weaving or after, or they were stitched as a repairmeasure when the slits begin to gape. In the example fromThe Hunters Picnic in the Louvre, a very large slit has been

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created where the dog’s stomach meets the dress of thefigure behind him (10). Stitches sewn over the slit keep thegap secure.

An alternative to creating slits is to create a dovetail joinwhere one colour briefly interjects into the warp of theadjacent colour (11). This might occur singularly or ingroups regularly or irregularly, close together or furtherapart. In Picasso’s Les Arlequins grouped dovetails havebeen used by the weavers, often pushing into a secondwarp creating a functional as well as a decorative join (13).

In The Abraham Tapestry the weavers have made noattempt to use the dovetails discretely. Instead they havebeen grouped together to make a thicker intrusion, as canbe seen in Abraham’s belt and the sacrificial ram, theweavers have made them part of the design as well asbeing functional (5, 6). They have been so regularly placeda calm rhythm is created across the tapestry.

We will see there are options open to the weaver to createa more blended effect between colours. And in theCharlemagne tapestry there is a far more realisticrendering of, for example, drapery and faces, and the useof a wider palette helps achieve that (8). However theweavers of The Abraham Tapestry have made a consciouschoice to use clear lines and bold delineated areas ofcolour. The result is a strong, crisp and harmonious textilethat compliments its limited palette perfectly. Whilst slitsmight be considered an inconvenience to some weavers,here the weavers have used the consequences of themedium to its advantage. There is no subtlety in thistapestry and it serves it well, there’s an honesty to it, asimplicity and an economy but it remains far fromuninteresting.

As well as where colours meet, slits also occur in TheAbraham Tapestry in areas of the same colour, for examplein the arms, hands and along the forehead (2, 4-5). Bycreating a slit in this manner a slight shadow or darkenedgap is formed that can be used to create an intricate detail

and a sense of modelling in the surface of the work. Inmany tapestries from Basel such asWild People HuntingDeer from the 1460s, slits were used by the weavers todefine the eyelids, cheeks and chin (14). However nowhereis the technique put to better use than in The Nine Heroesat the Cloisters (15) and in the Apocalypse of Angers (16),both woven in the fourteenth century. Here slits are usedto model the faces, shaping the orbits and nose and in theApocalypse it is used expertly to depict the anguish of thefigures, not least through the lines across the forehead.The weavers of the figure of Christ in The Lamentation ofthe Dead Christ in the Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts deBelgique in Brussels and woven around 1510, also madeincredible use of slits, using them to suggest veins in thehands and feet (18-19). In The Hunters Enter the Woods inthe Cloisters as well as many tapestries elsewhere, slits areused to form the features of dogs and other animals (17).This simple technique enabled weavers to create

astonishing, otherwise invisible details drawn, as it were,with nothing more than air and which nonetheless bringsthese figures to life.

Despite initial appearances, The Abraham Tapestry has notcome through its centuries entirely unscathed. For example,the faces of a couple of the figures have been eroded awayleaving just the exposed warp in place. This was not anuncommon feature of tapestries. To undergo the rigours oftension on the loom, the warp had to be particularly strong(usually linen), and could often survive longer than theweft (typically wool). This is especially true if a particularlyharmful dye was used that could weaken the weft furtheras is often seen in browns and blacks. In the exampleshown, a heraldry tapestry at Thun, part of the War Bootyof the Duke of Burgundy, it was notable that little of theblack and brown areas were intact, whereas the white andred areas were preserved (21).

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Despite the damage, at nearly 900 years old, the survival ofthe Halberstadt tapestries is remarkable. No doubt this is inpart due to the fact that it has hung in the same placesince it was made, in the choir of Halberstadt Cathedral. Infact the hooks are still in the walls which held it (20).Similar hooks for tapestries and textiles can be seen in usein contemporary manuscripts and wall paintings.

Tapestries by their very nature are moveable, easily takendown and transported elsewhere and put back up and thuswell suited to the peripatetic households of the period.However this did render their outer edges rathervulnerable to damage. It appears the border of theAbraham tapestry was not a victim of this and was insteadintentionally cut to fit the new dimensions of the rebuiltchoir and parts not on display remain extant (23).

In the few borders or selvedges that survive in othertapestries it was interesting to see in many of them therewere holes caused by hooks or nails. It was also particularlyinteresting to see that often these were at the side of thetapestry rather than, as one would assume, at the top. Thiswas particularly evident in the tapestryMadonna withEight Saints in the Met (24). In a hanging in Munich nailholes were evident in what is presumably a relativelyrecent repair to a 1450 tapestry (22).

It is not known in what context the Halberstadt tapestrieswere woven but clearly it was a professional workshopwith highly skilled and knowledgeable weavers. The formwas well established long before this first tapestry emergesso spectacularly through the historical record. This is alsothe case in nearby Quedlinburg, where in the cathedraltreasury large fragments of a twelfth century knottedcarpet, also made on a loom, survives. The Halberstadttapestries (and indeed the entire treasury) deserve to bebetter known and I am heartened that a full catalogue ofthe hundreds of textiles is nearing completion.

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Medallion Altar Front, Switzerland, 1300Schloss, Thun, Switzerland

Schloss, castle of Thun (pronounced Toone) with its whitetowers straight out of a fairytale, looks over a sapphirecoloured river running fast through the town below, andacross the cloud covered Alps that surround it. I wasunsure what I was going to find here, a fellow weaver hadalerted me to the tapestries here, but there was littleinformation online. Although it turned out there were onlythree pieces in the collection, the climb up the steep stepsthrough the town up towards the castle was entirely worththe effort.

In 1476 Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, undertook anignoble retreat in the face of the Swiss army at the Battleof Grandson. He left behind him a massive treasureincluding a large collection of tapestries. These are nowcurated by the Bernisches Historisches Museum in Bernand are undergoing conservation. However one of theDuke’s heraldry tapestries could be seen at Thun. Anothertapestry on display had been kept safe from historicaldestruction as it was mistakenly thought to be part of theDuke’s famous war booty too. The third tapestry, and theearliest of the tapestries, and in fact the earliest inSwitzerland, served as the altar front in the main church ofthe town until the reformation.

It consists of a red background interspersed withdecorative white crosses, with a canopied figure, SaintMauritius, patron saint of the town, standing in armour inits centre (3). Either side of him are connected medallions,most are blue although some have hints of green (4). Ineach medallion is a symbol with religious meaning,including those associated with Matthew, Mark, Luke andJohn (an angel, lion, ox and eagle respectively). Amongstthe other creatures were included the earliest wovendepiction of an animal which was to populate many atapestry - a unicorn representing the reincarnation ofChrist.

On first sight the tapestry is notable for its colour andboldness but closer inspection reveals something quiteremarkable on its surface, the remnants of delicate, andrather vulnerable, decorative stitching. On the angel thestitching is used to create the details of the face andsurviving fragments of couched stitching is used torepresent the hair (1). On Saint Mauritius the stitching isfurther used in chevrons to indicate his armour althoughthe red crosses that decorate his tunic are woven. Stitchingis also used to outline features on some of the creaturesand to create eyebrows although the eyes themselves aremostly woven, elsewhere they create scales on the wings

of the rooster and pelican, the unicorn’s mane, the teeth ofthe lion, the grain held by the cockerel and most alarminglyof all, the blood of a pelican pecking at itself to feed itsyoung, in representation of the sacrifices Christ made forhumankind (2). Banderoles remain empty, presumablytheir stitched lettering long gone.

Weaving of blank areas to be filled in later with eitherembroidery or paint was seen several times during myFellowship. In The Scenes Savages woven in the Rhinelandaround 1495 and exhibited by the Musées Royaux desBeaux-Arts de Belgique, the eerie blank faces are carefullyprofiled, sometimes with beard and moustaches added,but only faint traces of paint remain of the featuresthemselves (7). It wasn’t immediately clear why this shouldbe, the weavers clearly had the skills to weave the faces,why leave them to an embroiderer? It might have savedtime, but not much.

The Met of New York has a large collection of tapestriessome of which are on display at the Cloisters and in themedieval galleries of the colossal main museum in FifthAvenue. However I was very fortunate to be given access totapestries not on display. This includedMadonna and Eight

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Saints which was kindly made available for me to study atthe Antonio Ratti Textile Centre. Although the tapestry wasrelatively late, around 1550-1600, and was woven inSwitzerland, it was within an earlier non-painterly tradition.The size of the tapestry also made it a practical choice forviewing. The colours were exceedingly well preserved aswas the tapestry as a whole and it displayed an array oftechniques and accomplished details, and yet the faceswere woven entirely blank and the features were crudelyembroidered in (8). A highlight of my time in New York wasan invite to see the textile conservation laboratories andthere I was shown The Crucifixion even though it wasundergoing conservation prior to being loaned. Wovenaround 1325-1350 in Germany, it is one of the oldestwestern tapestries in the collection. Again the faces werewoven blank and embroidered, but I remained none thewiser as to why.

I was only confused more on studying the Tapestry withGames of Love woven around 1400 in Heidelberg and nowin Nuremburg (5). In this very detailed and accomplishedtapestry, both drawn faces and embroidered onesappeared together, whilst other facial features appear tobe woven. Two large tapestries depicting the life of Maryand which formed part of the treasury of HalberstadtCathedral, were both clearly made as a pair yet in onetapestry the faces were woven and in the other they werestitched (9).

In the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum at Munich numeroustapestries on display held evidence of embroidery. InSending out of the Apostles (Eichstatt c1520-1530) thewhites of the eyes and the pupils and lips are woven, butstitching was added to outline the eyes, eyebrows and nose,there’s also traces of embroidery used to write text in abanderole at the feet of a creature, although lettering iswoven elsewhere in the tapestry. And although thistapestry looks rather naive it is actually full of detail thatwould have been excruciating to weave, which makes onequestion the use of embroidery.

Also from Eichstatt and contemporaneous is a largetapestry of Saint Walburga, either-side of her are a gaggleof nuns with rather cross looking faces thanks to the crudeembroidery of them (6). There are also two small tapestriesdepicting Saints Apollonia and Lucia and whilst both havetheir eyes, lips and cheeks woven in the face, the eyebrows,eyelids and nose are stitched in. Moreover, in Luciastitching has been used to render the blood around herwound where a sword is pushed through her throat (10).This could easily have been woven fluidly using contouredwefts which we will come across later. But as embroidery itdoes stand out, it does draw the eye.

It is here I realise that my biases as a weaver are coming tothe fore; I see the bobbin being swapped for a needle asfailure on the part of the weaver, aided by the vaguememory of a reference to the painting of faces beingbanned suggesting it was looked down upon as a cheat, butannoyingly have failed to remember where. But what isclear is that the weavers could have woven what theychose to sew, it wasn’t always a cop-out but a consciousdecision. At first glance I don’t see how embroidery addsanything to the tapestry, but in truth, that is exactly what itdoes do. In the blood of Lucia’s neck here the use ofembroidery sits proud of the surface, demands attention,draws the eye, and highlights it and one is left to presumethat was its purpose, in these tapestries at least. And in theAltar Front of Thun the delicacy and texture created by thestitching contrasts very effectively with the bolder areas ofcolour in both the creatures and of the medallions. It drawsones attention and perhaps that is what it was there for.

But there are other ways to raise the surface of a tapestry.In Scenes from The Buzzard (1480) at the Musée Nationaldu Moyen Âge, a knotted pile is used on the sleeves of oneindividual and collars and cuffs of others (14). At Basel atapestry woven around the same time (Disappointed andFoolish Love) shows a raised technique used by theweavers to highlight the trimming of the dress, and whichappears to be created by looping the weft (13). Although alater tapestry, Tristran and Morgain’s Shield in the Muséede la Ville de Bruxelles at Brussels uses floating wefts, orwefts which travel over more than one warp to create anarray of decorative effects and was often employed whenusing metallic threads (12).Wild Woman with Unicorn is atapestry cushion cover on display at Basel andcontemporary with the Buzzard (11). Piling is used tohighlight the flowers in her hair and elsewhere in thetapestry. Sadly, whilst the glass has been removed frommost other tapestries in this gallery, it has had to stay inplace for her; visitors were apt to try touching her, schoolboys especially, apparently.

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The Apocalypse of Angers, Paris, 1382Châteaux d’Angers, Angers, France

In 1373 Louis I, Duke of Anjou, commissioned an enormoustapestry depicting the Book of Revelations from the NewTestament. It was designed by court painter Jean Bondoland woven in the workshops of Nicolas Bataille in Paris, thefinal piece being completed in 1382. It is now housed in theChâteaux d’Angers (pronounce an-jay), the ancestral homeof the Dukes of Anjou, and maintained by the Centre desMonuments Nationaux.

The first hints of the tapestry’s vastness can be gleaned asone looks over the 1950s structure built to house it (2). Thetapestry itself is extraordinary, the length of fourteen buses,one and a half times the height of a double-decker.Originally it was made of six sections (23m x 6m) withfourteen scenes on two levels as well as a poorly preservedborder of sky above and greenery below. Each section wasprefaced by a principal figure the height of both levels. 104metres of its original 140 metres remains, having sufferedover the centuries, even being used to rub down horsesand as construction filler.

I got there early and headed straight for the tapestry, Iwanted it to myself for a few minutes before the crowdsmade their way to it. Nothing can prepare you for pushingopen the door and being faced with that first panelemerging out of the darkness and then turning into theroom and seeing it run down its length, then another

corner, and more tapestry again. I don’t believe in any god,but it took me minutes to remember that what I was seeingwas created on a loom, by the fingertips of people, that ithadn’t been handed down from above by some mysticalforce as divine and terrifying and those portrayed in thetapestry.

The reasoning for its size remains a mystery, it would havebeen too large to hang in the castle, so where was it madefor? Also confusing is the nature of the back of the tapestry.Usually the back is full of tails of changed threads,sometimes resembling a rug. But with the Apocalypse all

ends have been woven in, the back is a mirror of the front.Does this mean both sides were once visible, rather than itbeing against a wall? To have produced this level ofneatness would have been incredibly time consuming andexpensive and cannot have been for no reason.

The lighting within the gallery is kept very low and a barrierkeeps visitors some distance from the tapestry surfaces.This is understandable, balancing the needs of the tapestrywith the needs of the visitor, but it did make close upexamination of the tapestry difficult, especially so for thetapestries in the upper register. This in no way diminishesthe experience for the general visitor, the power of thetapestry is in its whole rather than the individual panels.But I won’t lie, I was a little disappointed, I would never getclose enough to see the techniques at play (1).

The sett of a tapestry is the number of warp threads in aninch or centimetre and defines the fineness of a tapestry. Atapestry with four warps in every inch is going to be a lotcoarser than one with eight or sixteen threads in every inch.The finer the sett the greater the detail that can beachieved - but the longer it takes to weave.

When the French artist Jean Lurçat first came across theApocalypse in the 1930s it was to have a major impact onhis thinking as articulated in Designing Tapestry first

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published in 1947 and in English in 1950. He became criticalof the Gobelins workshops in Paris which were producingtapestries at incredibly fine setts. Lurçat argued suchfineness was wasteful and unnecessary, the Apocalypsewas woven at around 12 warp ends per inch after all(although it varied throughout the tapestry). He alsoargued the workshops were wasteful using thousands ofcolours, when, as in the Apocalypse, a limited paletteserved just as well, and was, in fact, better. The Apocalypsehad less than twenty colours, and this inspired Lurçat todevise a ‘scale of prearranged colours’, just 6-7 colourswith five shades each.

He also argued tapestries were a mural art form inopposition to easel paintings, they were more akin tofrescoes than small paintings. And unlike easel paintingswhich could be hung anywhere, tapestries were oftendesigned with a specific place in mind, they were intimatelyconnected with their setting, thus giving tapestry anarchitectural significance. He suggested that tapestriesshould be woven with a “feeling for the wall” (p.35) andthat tapestries on a small scale lost their power. To himtapestry was not an “art of slender proportions, but an artof a monumental order” (p.3).

To Lurçat the Apocalypse was tapestry in its purest,unadulterated form. A coarser sett and a limited palettehelped to create bold and sturdy designs and these Lurçatargued served tapestry much better. Tapestry wasprimitive, and came to life through juxtaposition andcontrast of colours. It was not the delicate or subtlemedium it was pretending to be.

Although the Apocalypse was to impact all his subsequentwork, Lurçat’s response culminated in a series of ten majortapestries known collectively as Le Chant du Monde. Thetapestries are curated in St John’s hospital, an impressivestructure in its own right, founded in the twelfth centuryand a short walk from the castle (3). The tapestries hang inwhat was the Great Ward, the remnants of an apothecaryin a corner, one of the few hints as to its former use. The

building was used as an archaeology museum for sometime, until Le Chant du Monde arrived in 1967.

It seeks to explore our place in the universe, our owndestruction and survival. Although inevitably tainted byLurçat’s experience of two world wars and the threat of theatomic bomb, ultimately the series offers a vision of hope.It is a theme not unrelated to, and certainly equal to, theApocalypse of Angers in its scope and message. Thetapestry was woven in the workshops of long-timecollaborators in Aubusson, the ateliers of Tabard, Picaudand Goubely, between 1957-1966. Lurçat was a designer oftapestries, not a weaver himself. The series is unfinished,Lurçat died in 1966 when the final tapestry was still on theloom. From Lurçat’s writing it is clear an additional fivetapestries were meant to be part of the cycle.

I must confess that whilst I am interested in some ofLurçat’s ideas, I have not always been so drawn to his work,but that has all changed. The first four tapestries see thedestruction of the world and include the striking andhorrific L’Homme d’Hiroshima (The Man of Hiroshima)where a human figure and symbols of civilisationdisintegrate with the creation of the atomic bomb (4). Thefinal tapestries of the series seek to explore renewal andinclude Conquête de l’espace (the Conquest of Space)

where strata of flora and fauna represent the Earth fromwhich an archer strikes into the unknown, represented byplanets and a fanciful milky way (5). The penultimatetapestry La Poésie (Poetry), offers a direct reference to theApocalypse tapestry in its format of a larger figure (thepoet) and registers of smaller scenes (the Zodiac),mirroring the medieval original (6).

In each of Lurçat’s tapestries a limited palette sparks fromthe black grounding. Their design is thick with the symbolicvocabulary he had developed in previous years, andfacilitated by calques, or tracings, created by himself andhis assistants. All of Lurçat’s principles are here, boldness,monumentality, juxtaposition.

Next door to the hospital was an orphanage and in 1986 itbecame the Musée Jean-Lurçat et de la tapisseriecontemporaine and it houses recent works, as well as thoseby Lurçat and his contemporaries. Amongst Lurçat’s othertapestries were two in particular that were fundamental tohis development as a tapestry designer. Le Vent, waswoven in 1931 by Cuttoli who, in an attempt to revivetapestry, requested designs from several prominent artistsof the time including Picasso, Matisse and Léger.Interestingly this tapestry was woven vertically (7). L’Archerwas a needlepoint prototype stitched in 1927; it was amethod Lurçat used early in his career when experimentingwith the simplification of tapestry techniques (8).

I returned to the castle a few days after my initial visit for ameeting with several folk from the Monuments Nationauxresponsible for looking after the tapestry. I had hoped, atmost, for a bit of insight into how the tapestries had beenwoven, especially in the light of some recent workconducted on some of the tapestries. What I was notexpecting was to be invited into the storeroom, wheresome partial panels were taken out for me to study (12). Tohave had this access was an astonishing privilege, andsomething I will never forget.

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The first of the main fragments depict St John before anangel, St John being the narrator who appears in mostpanels observing the Apocalypse (9, 13). In the secondfragment, folk struggle under the burning sun as the fourthplague/bowl is unleashed and the planet becomesscorched (10). There were also smaller pieces of angelwings, background and border (11).

The tapestries close up were, quite frankly, the mostsophisticated weaving I have ever seen. And to imagine thiswas sustained across the rest of the tapestry wasoverwhelming. We will be looking at this tapestry in moredetail as we approach some of the techniques in it, but inthose fragments and partial panels, I saw every possibleweaving technique. I think one of the successes of thetapestry was that no technique dominated, everything wasdone so subtly, so purely, in such moderation andjudgement, that the whole was in complete balance. TheApocalypse was the absolute pinnacle of what tapestry canbe.

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The Falcon’s Bath, South Netherlands, 1400-1415The Cloisters, New York, US

In the 1930s in uptown New York work began on theconstruction of a museum in the form of a medieval abbeyand which incorporated historical architectural elementsincluding several cloisters from which the museum takes itsname. It is a branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art(known as the Met) and houses its medieval collectionincluding ivory, stained glass, painting, sculptures and tombsculptures and tapestries.

A major draw of the museum are the set of seventapestries woven around 1495-1505, probably in Brussels,and which depict the hunting and submission of theUnicorn, an allusion to the Passion, or courtship - theirexact meaning has been much debated. This series hasloomed large in the consciousness of tapestry weaversbased in the UK; a project lasting over a decade has soughtto recreate them, albeit on a coarser scale for StirlingCastle. Also housed at the Cloisters are the spectacularremains of The Nine Heroes tapestries albeit fragmentaryand reconstructed. These tapestries were of particularinterest due to their supposed relationship with theApocalypse of Angers, it once being suspected they wererelatively contemporary and even emerged from the same

workshop, although such an association has beenchallenged.

These two sets are rightly famous. However it was a morerecent addition to the collection that I found particularlyentrancing. This was The Falcon’s Bath woven around1400-1415 in the Southern Netherlands. Around thecentral scene of four figures before a rose coated trelliswas a grounding of highly stylised flowers (1-5). Theweaving was extraordinarily accomplished and neatcreating a clean, crisp surface. There were also smallerfigures towards each corner, and the figure of a girl in thelower right corner in particular drew my attention (18).

Millefleur tapestries are characterised by a backgroundfilled with the flowers from which they take their name.The Falcon’s Bath was the earliest millefleur tapestry Iobserved, and a selection of others are shown overleaf,Peafowl and Children surrounded by Millefleur (1500-1510)at Musée des Arts Décoratifs (1), Armourial Bearings andBadges of John, Lord Dynham (1488-1501) (2), Altar Frontwith Instruments of the Passion (1475-1550) (11) and TheUnicorn in Captivity, (1495-1505) (8) at the Cloisters,

Allegorical Scene (early sixteenth century) (10) and Scenesfrom Noble Pastoral (1500) (9, 14) at the Louvre,Giohargius and Tubalcain (1500-1520) (12), Scenes of theNoble Life (1500-1520) (13), The Lady and the Unicorn cycle(c1500?) (15, 17) at the Musée National du Moyen Âge andMilliefleur (1446) (16) at Bernisches Historisches Museumin Berne.

I do here have to confess I have never been particularlyfond of them. It seemed odd to me to have disembodiedfigures or scenes on islands plonked in the middle offloating plants and flowers. I suppose they lack a unity forme although that does not mean I cannot appreciate theskill that went into them. Indeed some of the plants andflowers in these tapestries are so beautifully and accuratelyrendered much scholarly ink has been spilt trying toidentify them. However I was made to question my dislikeof millefleur tapestries on seeing the vast example thatformed part of the booty of the Duke of Burgundy and isnow on display in Berne. Its size and the black backgroundmade me wonder how breathtaking it would have been tohave sat before it as those plants and flowers would have

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jumped from the surface in a room lit by shimmeringcandlelight (16).

I found myself even less irked by The Falcon’s Bath. There isa sturdiness to the abstract quality of the flowers, theycould never be accused of being twee, a slander that mightbe more easily thrown at later millefleur tapestries. Thereis little attempt at realism, many are little more than circles,squares and ovals but as a result they are unfussy, and thethin leaved nature of the flowers created a sense offeathery unity lost to me in other millefleur tapestries.Inevitably amongst the plants and flowers there is usually abunny, or other creature thrown in amongst them, but inThe Falcon’s Bath only other birds were present, and thesesimply but effectively rendered. In this tapestry as in manyothers seen, darker leaves or background shapes behindlighter ones are used to created an illusion of depth andlayers to the foliage a technique also frequently seen in thetapestries of William Morris, also influenced by medievaloriginals.

The girl in the right hand corner had suffered some damageto her lower edge, but otherwise she was relatively wellpreserved, and looks to be placing a hood over a tetheredfalcon she holds. She wears a blue and white dress withvoluminous sleeves and her hair is captured in an elaborateheaddress (18).

Many tapestries now, including my own prior to myFellowship, are reliant on blending multiple colouredthreads on the bobbin to create beautifully mottled effectson the loom. With two, four, six, or even more threads on abobbin, it is difficult to predict what colour will emerge asthe bundle snakes around the warp creating a randomnessand surface unique to tapestry. But historically tapestrieswere woven with a single colour on a bobbin, as was TheFalcon’s Bath. But in the headdress of the girl is apink-trimmed blue and white mottled veil or ribbon.

This blending on the bobbin, or chiné, was observed in

numerous other tapestries. In the fragments of theApocalypse of Angers it was used to weave leaves andstems, to model drapery in the clothing, to highlight angelwings and in the patterning of the background motifs,adding interest to the surface and to differentiate areas ofsimilar colour (19-24). In the twelfth century Abrahamtapestry at Halberstadt chiné is used along the length of asword raised to kill Isaac and in the rim of a goblet set on

the table before a visiting angel (31). In this tapestry thechiné might suggest the shine of metal, perhaps evenmimic more expensive metallic threads, but it is also usedentirely decoratively in the border of the associatedtapestry of the Apostles.

Chiné was also used in the goblet and sword of a tapestrytelling the story of the biblical Joseph woven in Nurembergin 1450/1460 and also to create flowers (35). In other

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tapestries from Nuremberg it was used as ribbons to depictwater in the scene of a shipwreck in The Legend of SaintSebaldus (1425) (33). It was also used as water in thewashing of Christ’s feet during the last supper in a 1450tapestry woven in Nuremburg but on display in Munich(36). In the tapestries from Basel it was rarely used but canbe found, for example in the ear of one of the creatures inLovers with Mythical Beasts (1480) (34) and in the cutwood ofWild People Hunting Deer (c1468) and which helpsthe branches stand out from a busy tapestry (32).

Whilst in earlier tapestries chiné seems to have been usedin modest, discreet areas to add interest, or to indicatesomething shiny or transparent, the painterly effects thatcould be achieved by using blended bobbins becamereadily apparent to more contemporary weavers. Lurçatinitially baulked at it as too painterly, but in the last panelsof Le Chant du Monde it starts to make an appearance,perhaps most effectively in the ribbon of chiné used for theMilky Way in the Conquest of Space and elsewhere in theseries (27).

My own work at the time used multiple blends of yarnmixed with varying degrees of black to create a sense ofsinking into the background (37), so the work of MarcoPrassinos at the Musée Jean-Lurçat et de la tapisseriecontemporaine in Angers was particularly mesmerising forme as it was precisely this technique that dominated hiswork in the two abstract tapestries on display. His palettewas also similar to mine, focusing on reds, creams,mustards and browns. InMacbeth the beautiful boldabstract shapes tapered into the background (26, 29) andinMai, amongst the explosion of shapes there was alwaysa new configuration to marvel at (30). The use of blackthreads within the chiné combinations was also heavilyevident in Broderie’s Le Vin du Vertiage, but rather than ascattering of distinct shapes as seen in Prassinos’stapestries, the blending was used to create an astonishingsense of transparency and fluidity across the wholetapestry (25, 28). This was also achieved by blending on thebobbin colours similar to one another, rather than thosethat contrasted as seen in the medieval tapestries and inThe Falcon’s Bath.

It is possible that in The Falcon’s Bath the girl’s veil, likewater, is meant to be transparent, or of course, it couldjust be decorative. Either way this figure stood out to mefor another reason, and that was in the simplicity of herface, which was still yet full of character despite thatsimplicity; I am of course being polite enough to ignore herhideous ears. This is in part achieved through heruncluttered eyes, rendered with barely more than a slit

between the warps, but also to the modelling of her facecreated using a technique not suitable for the faint atheart.

Weft is usually introduced to the warp perpendicularly.However it is possible to place weft at an angle over anarea already built up and this can create beautifullyexpressive and flowing lines. But it also risks buckling thesurface of the tapestry; at the end of the day it is a cloththat is being produced and it is subject to the same laws oftension and structure as any other. If these contouredwefts are used too often or at too steep an angle, disasterwill follow and often one does not discover the extent ofthe distortion until the tension is removed from the loom.

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Some modern weavers, for example Aino Kajamiemi andLynne Curran, seem to be able to use the technique withimpunity, but as a lesser mortal I restrict its usage or avoidit all together. However it did not seem to deter earlierweavers.

Contoured wefts were commonly seen where a sense offlow was needed, and it was universally used to depict hair,either in long strands or in curls. Examples include twotapestries woven in Brussels around 1520 (Christ is Born asMan’s Redeemer (the Cloisters) (40) and Humanitysurprised by the Seven Deadly Sins (Musées Royaux desBeaux-Arts de Belgique) (43)) and The Adoration of theMagi (c1490-1500) possibly woven in Bamburg and ondisplay in Munich (41), and alsoMadonna with Eight Saintsfrom around 1550-1600 and now in the Met (42). Anumber of different effects could be achieved by differingthe thickness of the strands and in the variety of thecontour’s length as well as how they interacted with oneanother and in the homogeneity of the materials used.

In the image of The Beautiful Ladies we can see contouredwefts have been used to add a sweeping decoration to thecloak of the figures (Chapter 2, 9). A mixture of contouredand straight wefts were used in the Apostles tapestry inHalberstadt to give a flow to the drapery on several figures.Contoured wefts were also useful in depicting flames as inDeath of Lazarus woven in Basel around 1490 (39), and thesun’s rays in the Apocalypse of Angers (38). In theseexamples the picture has been turned (remembering thattapestries are woven on their side) to show the angle ofthe contoured wefts against the warps.

The face of John from the Apocalypse of Angers has alsobeen re-orientated to how it might have been seen by theweavers, we can see the extent to which contoured weftshave been used to model the face and throat (44). Thecurls of the beard have been sandwiched with straightrows rather than contoured weaving presumably to addtexture and to try to lessen some of the distortion that isclearly visible if one tries to trace the now wayward warps.

Whilst the use of contoured wefts is incrediblysophisticated in the Apocalypse of Angers, one can see inthe face of the girl in The Falcon’s Bath there are contouredwefts shaping the eye socket on the right of her facetowards the side of her nose. It seems a single curve hasalso been placed to render the shape of her cheek. It is atechnique that has been used so delicately here, and yet itstill has the power to lift her face and her character aboveall the others in this particular tapestry.

The Hunt of the Unicorn tapestries are breathtaking in theirdetail, and for their slick execution and a shimmeringsurface that dances off the walls. They are spectacular andrightly famous, but for me it was The Falcon’s Bath that

was far more inviting and interesting. This was in part dueto the simplicity of its execution, but also it was because ofthe appropriateness of its setting. Within the cloisters fromwhich the museum takes its name were gardens filled withthe flowers represented in the tapestry, and amid thefountains in their centre, birds darted to and fro goingabout their business. As one enjoyed an eye-wateringlyexpensive lunch beneath the shade of the medieval arches,one could look on exactly the same view that inspired thetapestry hanging inside 600 years ago. It captured whatwould have been a familiar sight to those who owned itperfectly, and perhaps in that there was more realism forme, than the more stock-like figures and perfection andformal design of the Unicorn tapestries.

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The Betrothal of St. Catherine, the Last Supper, Nuremberg, 1450Bavarian Nationalmuseum, Munich, Germany

Nuremberg was a centre for tapestry production in thefifteenth century, but little is known about the workshopsapart from the one associated with a nunnery, StCatherine’s, now sadly in bombed-out ruins. It is difficult tounderstand why these tapestries appealed so much to me.They are relatively small, typically rather narrow andelongated. The characters are cartoon like, repetitious,with little attempt at individualism.

Whilst several examples are on display in the GermanischesNationalmuseum, Nuremburg, I am focusing on an exampleat the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum in Munich, simplybecause the lighting allowed more detailed images and arethus the most appropriate to share here.

The tapestry has been cut in two, in the left section StCatherine reaches out for the ring Jesus, in Mary’s arms,extends to her. John, with his chalice and snake, witnessesthe betrothal. On the second panel is the last supper, theapostles around a table, Jesus appearing twice, once at thetable and once washing the feet of Peter. In typical fashionJudas sits apart, no halo, a purse prominent, and withrather uglier features (2). John leans against Christ’s bosom,

looking as if asleep. Although a border marks the left mostedge of the tapestry, it once extended further to the right.

The faces are simply rendered (3, 4). Eyelids, eyebrows,nose and lips defined by the weft wrapping around a singlewarp. At the Châteaux d’Angers this technique wasreferred to as guimpage and rightly or wrongly I’ve beenusing the term since.

Tapestry is not a fluid medium. It is essentially an imagecreated on a grid created by the warps. It is far easier tocreate a line that journeys through the warps than travelsup them, as vertical lines will always be the width of thewarp, there will always be steps as the weft passes fromone warp to another to create a shape or line.

Nonetheless guimpage is useful for outlining which is aprominent feature of these Nuremburg tapestries as wellas others. This technique produces slits either-side of thewarp destabilising the fabric and which are harder to fix bysewing. Here the guimpage is has been secured in placethrough the use of dovetailing. Although this is delicatelydone in the facial features, it is more heavily rendered

elsewhere adding to the pattern (1).

Despite the simple method of making the face, a great dealof individualism is achieved in the differing figures,although in related tapestries at the GermanischesNationalmuseum they are rather more indistinguishable.The use of pink colouring used to define the nose andcheeks in the example on display in Munich is absent inother examples at Nuremburg.

When a thread of weft is laid down into the warp, it doesnot actually form a row, but rather a dot (or bead) overevery other warp, as it disappears behind the others. Tomake a solid line the weaver has to lay down two rows ofthread, the second row fills in the gaps left by the first.A solid line is referred to as a pass or a duite, and the lineof dots as a demi duite, half pass, or pick.

Weaving a half pass was often used by weavers to create adelicate sense of transparency as seen in the veil in a figurein The Lady and the Unicorn cycle and also, as shown, in theshawl in Allegorical Scene in the Louvre (6). It was also used

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to soften lines, especially in drapery. Examples here includeScenes of the Legend of Saint Etiene woven around 1500and now in the Musée National du Moyen Âge (12). In TheUnicorn Defends Himself (1495-1505) in the Cloisters inNew York, this technique is used to great effect in thedrapery but also to add a hint of shine in the thigh of oneof the figures (7).

By alternating the colours between passes, stripes (orrayures) can be formed. These are woven horizontally,perpendicular to the warp, but once the tapestry is turnedto be hung, they appear vertical. Obviously the thickness,density and regularity of these stripes can be varied tocreate differing effects. The use of this technique has been

used several times in this tapestry, for example in thehaloes where it provides more interest than had they allbeen plain (3). It is used to create the hair and beard ofAbraham in the Halberstadt tapestries although it isabandoned by the time the Apostles tapestry was woven(Chapter 2, 5). It was often used in the landscaping oftapestries from Strasbourg (13) and can also be seen in theflames from the Apocalypse (14). As we will see, thetechnique also has its uses in shading and modelling as canbe seen here creating shadow on the tablecloth and tosuggest its folds in this tapestry (2).

In the tapestries of Lurçat, including Le Chante du Monderepeated stripes were used to contrast adjacent shapeswoven more solidly. This is also seen in his Liberté tapestryin the museum in Angers where both striped and solidclouds form the background (10). Lurçat’s contemporary,Tourliere, used rayure in abstract shapes alongside chiné,to create beautiful and haunting undulating tapestries suchas Vin de Lune to reflect the regimented lines of vineyards(11). Luminous colour transitions are created as the shapesmeet, contrast, thin, thicken, lighten, darken and intersectall through the use of striations. A formality of technique isat the core of this work and despite its complexity itcreates a calming surface.

Mategot also uses rayures alongside guimpage to greateffect in Le Derrick, creating sheaf like structures (8). Thiswas one of the most dramatic tapestries seen during theFellowship. It was the most painterly of those on display atthe Musée Jean-Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine,some areas seeming to mimic brush-strokes by using chiné,juxtaposing solid and blended areas, almost giving theeffect of paint thinning from a brush. It was also the leasthomogeneous of the tapestries, with much internalvariation in the shapes and techniques used and wasincredibly successful. This tapestry, like the others, wasvery illusionistic. The tapestry seen from a distance andclose up were entirely different experiences.

If a weaver lays down half passes or demi duites inalternate colours, the repeated positioning of the samecoloured bead on the same warp creates rows up the warp,which when hung appear horizontal. This technique isoften used to good effect in stylised foliage. An exampleshown here is from Scenes Savages at the Musées Royauxdes Beaux-Arts de Belgique in Brussels and woven around1495 (9).

This regular pattern can be interrupted by a change incolour and this can create a variety of chequered and

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honeycomb patterns. For example, in the sword Catherineholds, there is a pattern created by these demi duite in itshandle (5). In Sending out of the Apostles, an extraordinarytapestry in Munich, the use of demi duite to depict treesand flowers is taken to astounding levels (23). There isbarely a millimetre free of detail in this tapestry and it musthave taken a great deal of skill to weave, although it is alsoquite crude in other aspects.

Although demi duite was present in a wide range oftapestries, it was used extensively in the tapestries of Basel,both as rows and in interrupted forms. It was often used todetail flowers and was particularly effective in highlightingstrawberries, acorns and thistles (20). It often appeared inthe curls of banderoles and trimmed clothing in hems,collars and cuffs and in some instances larger areas such asskirts and sleeves and shoes (21). It was used to decoratethe bodies of birds, and feathers and plumage to greateffect (17). Other areas where they could be found were inthe studs of a knife hilt, table cloths, knife handles,pedestals (19, 20). In Love Garden with Tent (1490) it wasused for the tent ropes as well as foliage, headdresses,blades and leaves and in the brickwork of a well (20, 22). InFive of the Nine Worthies (1480-1490) it was executed withamazing precision creating plumage for a helmet and themane of a boar in a shield (15, 16). Demi duite was ofcourse to be found in tapestries outside of Basel but inthese it was ubiquitous and used in imaginative ways. It

struck a chord with me as it was a technique that employedthe qualities of weave to make the pattern, it could only beachieved in warp and weft.

These tapestries were very colourful and highly patterned,barely a hair’s breadth was free from decoration in oneform or other. This was particularly astounding on realisingthey were all interlocked. This is a method of joining twocolours; when different colours met the threads wouldconnect like linked arms. Rather than being able to builddiscrete blocks of colour, it meant each tapestry wouldhave to have been woven row by row, incredibly timeconsuming. Apart from the Basel tapestries it was rarelyseen during the Fellowship. It is more obvious from theback of a tapestry, but from the front it is visible as atoothed edged join.

The busyness of these tapestries is in a direct contrast tothe tapestries of St Catherine’s at Nuremburg. These(mostly) have a simple landscape with a few items ofstylised foliage and trees and sometimes chunkyarchitectural elements. They are characterised by crispnessaided by an absence of unnecessary pattern or oversewingof slits, there is a calmness and regularity, plainbackgrounds and a limited palette dominated by reds andgreens which zing against the black background. There is aboldness in their simplicity and their focus is clear. 23

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The Woodworkers, Tournai, 1460Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France

The Woodworkers, woven in Tournai and now in Muséedes Arts Décoratifs, was one of the most fascinatingtapestries I saw in Paris. Also known as Les Bucherons auxarmes de Nicolas Rolin, it shows figures in a woodlandsetting chopping down, sawing and storing wood. I have asoft spot for tapestries attributed to Tournai and as well asthis one, I include here The Hunters Picnic in the Louvreand Sheep Shearers in Brussels.

These tapestries are full of life, yet the figures are allpurposeful and a sense of depth is created by layering theaction on top of one another, the eye is drawn all over thescene, something new to notice each time. The depictionof their clothing is reliant on simple technique, rather thanfilling it with pattern mimicking the opulent fabrics of theday. Later tapestries become infested with individuals,often nothing more than heads and shoulders, crowds toadd interest to a scene which, in my opinion, is created farmore successfully in these Tournai tapestries. There is aplumpness to the figures and their faces, an absence of thepretence of realism.

However it wasn’t because of the techniques used in thisparticular tapestry or its design that captivated me, butbecause the fabric of the tapestry itself told its own story.

Like most folk of my previous profession I am fascinated bywhat has been lost to time. Finding hints of what hasotherwise disappeared provides a connection to one’sforbears. A thumbprint left on a ceramic before it dried canbe as precious as a complete Ming vase. Intentional or not,it is a ‘hello' across the centuries from one human toanother.

I am in this project trying to engage with my weavingpredecessors, to learn from them through what they haveleft behind. Sometimes their decisions are clear andobvious, but sometimes more subtle decisions andmundane actions are left in the tapestries.

Tapestries were usually made with one or more weaverssat next to each other. If their work met in a straight line, itwould create a gigantic slit up the tapestry between a pair

of warps. To avoid this the work of neighbouring weaversmet in a diagonal line or something similar, for example aconvenient shape in the design. These ‘cut backs’ or ‘lazylines’ often remain visible as tiny slits and were observedrepeatedly during my travels. As well as being useful to seewhere one weaver handed over to another, they can alsoindicate how a weaver might break up larger areas ofweaving.

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In the Apocalypse diagonal lines are clear in thebackground as they were in many others (1). Below is froma tapestry, The Young Hercules (1480) from Musées Royauxdes Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels, showing cut backsbreaking up a wall (2).

There were many instances where these lines occurred inthe plainer background around more complicated areas.Perhaps they suggest areas where more experiencedweavers might take over more detailed areas, with thosewith less experience focusing on the grounding. Anexample of these lines can be seen around the face of Johnin the partial fragment of the Apocalypse (Chapter 5, 44).Such marks were also visible in The Lady and the Unicorn

cycle, for example around the paw in the tapestry depictingthe sense of smell (3). It should be noted that these markscan also be used as decoration and were seen several timesin the tapestries of Nuremberg as such.

The division of weaving areas can also be seen when slightchanges in dye batches occur, or when their relativelightfastness causes different hanks of wool to fadedifferently, and these become more visible over time.Presumably if the colour differences in the hanks werevisible at the time of their use, they would not have beenchosen. These lines and shapes were particularly evident inthe vast areas of black background in Le Chant du Mondetapestries (5), and also in several panels of the Apocalypse.In the example shown there are several pinker areas in thebackground (4). They reveal patches of where the weaverconcentrated before moving on elsewhere. These shapesfascinate me because they are a remnant of the hand ofthe weaver, rather than an element of the design, they area subconscious action, not meant to be seen, they are thethumb print in the clay, that unintentional hello.

Tapestries are woven sequentially, working from thebottom up, otherwise the weaver would not be able toopen the warps to let the weft through. You can’t weavesomething if it is sitting on top something else not yetwoven. So in a way tapestries are made up in layers, thereis a stratigraphy to them, not too dissimilar to theformation of layers created by walls and pits and floorsbuilt up over time as seen in the section of anarchaeological site. I could not help but wonder if usingthese cut backs and dye discrepancies to map out theselayers or events in a tapestry, as an archaeologist would,might help us see how these tapestries were woven andthe order in which elements were approached. Such workmight even involve constructing something akin to a HarrisMatrix, a tool used by archaeologists to establishsequences and relationships. Certainly beyond the scope ofthis project, but something I would be keen to pursue inthe future. Perhaps it has been done, perhaps it is a ratherpointless exercise, perhaps it merely indicates you can takea girl out of archaeology but not archaeology out of thegirl.

And here I find myself standing in wonder before TheWoodworkers once more, and in front of one figure inparticular. He is one half of a team of two, sawing at a log.Both he and the rest of the tapestry have been subject tomuch damage, restoration and repair (6). However he is analmost entirely blank figure. That this was never the

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intention of the weavers is shown by tiny slits bobbingabout the tapestry (7). These are ‘ghosts’ created by thebobbin turning back, one can even see there is a regularityto the slits, a rhythm, steps where a technique calledhachure was once woven (a technique which we will soonvisit in more detail). Clearly this figure would have oncebeen far more detailed and colourful than he is today, butthe dyes have faded and disappeared over time.

Looking at the back of tapestries which have not beenexposed to light will often give a far better indication of thetrue colours used by the weavers. Colours not only faded,they also changed. A well known phenomenon is greenchanging into blue. Originally it would have been madewith blue and yellow but as the yellow is less stable anddisappears first, only blue is left. Perhaps this explains whysome of the medallions in the Swiss altar front in Thun area mix of blue and green, green being the original. Only aglimpse at the back may indicate the truth. This processalso explains why so much foliage in tapestries appearsblue rather than green. Incidentally this more subduedpalette was preferred by William Morris and exploited inhis work.

It wouldn’t be unusual to get discrete areas of fading in atapestry if, for example, a piece of furniture was placed infront of it, or a picture (sacrilegiously) was hung over it, orif an area was the particular target of sunlight. But thisdoes not appear to be the case with The Woodworkers, it isdown to the make up of the dyes used. This becomes evenmore evident in areas where colour still remains. Forexample, in a rabbit brown yarn is used to model its bodywhich suddenly disappears although tiny slits of losthachure remain (8). Presumably this too was once brownbut has faded; perhaps at the back of the tapestry the tailsof thread will indicate a new yarn has been introduced by

the weaver. There are similar hints of missing colour in thepaw, and perhaps even feeding into the remaining brownof the rabbit’s back.

I have no idea why these changes fascinated me so much,except, as I said before, as an archaeologist, I am usually

more fascinated by what is gone than what survives.Perhaps I am only trying to find a positive in thisphenomenon, because otherwise it can only put the fear ofGod into weavers that our work may end up as whitesheets one day, full of tiny holes.

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Scene from The Buzzard, Upper Rhine, 1480Musée National du Moyen Âge, Paris, France

At 80cm x 130cm Scene from the Buzzard at the MuséeNational du Moyen Âge is one of the smallest tapestriesstudied. In truth it did not appeal, it was very cartoon-like.For me it lacked drama, it lacked awe, perhaps, no doubtdue to its size. Although, in a pair of figures it did seem toprovide evidence that mansplaining is as old as the hills (1).Nonetheless it wouldn’t have occurred to me to focus onthis particular tapestry in this report had I not nearlyundergone whiplash as I strode, running out of time,through a gallery in Nuremberg.

The Buzzard is a medieval poem about the elopement of aFrench princess and an English prince who weresubsequently separated, only to be reunited after theprince had spent some time as a wild man in the woods. Inthis particular scene the prince seems to be making hismove during a tournament.

A cartoon is the design that sits behind the warps andguides the weaver. They can take many forms, from simpleoutlines to fully-fledged paintings. I am a weaver of myown cartoons, I weave my own designs, and forpractitioners not based in commercial studios this isgenerally the case. But the concept of the artist-weaver is a

relatively recent one. As we have seen Lurçat himself wasnot a weaver, but a cartoonist, and the roles between thetwo were clearly delineated historically. However that thiswas not always the case is suggested by a successfulfifteenth century complaint by painters in Brussels that thecity’s weavers were making their own cartoons.

What was the relationship between the cartoon and thefinal tapestry? What freedoms if any did weavers have tointerpret a cartoon as they pleased? There were a numberof instances where what might be seen as mistakes werevisible in a tapestry and which might more readily be laid atthe feet of the weaver than the maker of the cartoon. Onepresumes that the cartoonist would have the benefit ofseeing their designs as a whole and could correct themistake whereas a weaver would only ever see a small partof the tapestry as the bulk of what was woven beforehandwould be wound onto the beam. Do these discrepanciessuggest that such elements were at the discretion of theweaver?

For example, it seemed to me there were subtledifferences in the way hair was woven in a central figure inJudith and Holefernes in Brussels and woven in the early1

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sixteenth century. On her left side the hair is made of longcontoured wefts whereas on the right it is made of shortthin mounds (5).

Perhaps such details were left to the weaver, or perhapsdifferent weavers worked on the hair bringing their ownstyle, perhaps there was significant length of time betweenweaving the different areas, perhaps one side was alreadyhidden beneath the beam when the other was woven.

Likewise I managed to convince myself I saw changes in thepattern of flooring in a tapestry of the Annunciation in theMusée National du Moyen Âge (6). On the left they areangled and on the right they are straight. Is this an attemptat perspective, or the tiles on the left having been woundon to the beam? Also in the Musée National du Moyen Âgeis a tapestry which shows a lady spinning with a spindle andthe motif of her costume is decidedly off-centre (2). In theBasel tapestries there were a number of areas where the

upper borders tended to wander and gaps formed, oftenhaving to be filled in, as is the case of Pledge of Troth andLove Oracle woven around 1430 (4). Again, one wouldexpect design-based anomalies like this to have been fixedbefore the tapestry ever got near the loom. Were suchareas omitted from the cartoon and left to the weaver? Butof course there might be other reasons for such mistakes.In the tapestry of the Apostles at Halberstadt the tapestryon the right and left sides differ considerably, the figureson the right are bunched up and architectural detailsomitted, but rather than any change of heart in the weaveror cartoonist, the space the tapestry was intended for wasdestroyed and the new choir rebuilt in differing dimensions,which also meant the tapestry had to change sizemid-weave to fit.

Cartoons themselves were roughly used and rarely surviveespecially those on paper. There are exceptions of course,including those by Raphael and which are now on display atthe V&A and which heralded a new era for tapestry design.Whilst in Brussels I learned the Musée de la Ville deBruxelles was undertaking a major project restoring anearly sixteenth century cartoon, theMartyrdom of SaintPaul, by Pieter Coecke van Aelst, and although it wasoutside the scope of my project it was impossible not toinclude it in my itinerary (3, 7). Although the restorationworkshop was closed on the day I visited, the very kindstaff opened it for me. The restoration was supported byan excellent exhibition which included the history of thecartoon and others, information about its creator, tapestryproduction in Brussels and the results of the investigationof the cartoon including instructions to the weaver, the inkso faded they are now only visible through infrared, thatthe cartoon had also been replicated at some point in itshistory through pricking and pouncing; that there were alsonumerous repairs made to the cartoon also came to light.The cartoon itself was made from a patchwork ofoverlapping paper sheets. As well as windows into theworkshop, there was a facsimile of the cartoon in itsoriginal condition, and a late (and rather crudely made)

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tapestry woven from it. Reference materials were alsoavailable for visitors to access as well as digital displays.

One of Lurçat’s cartoons was on display in Angers, for theL’Homme d’Hiroshima (The Man of Hiroshima) (8). Lurçat’scartoons were made directly, rather than from an originalart work, or a smaller preparatory drawing sometimescalled a maquette or petit patron. The cartoon on displaywas reversed (as tapestries were woven from the back) andwas a strip, better suited to being placed under the warpsof a basse lisse loom. Lurçat used a coded cartoon, amethod quickly taken up by his contemporaries, whichspelled out to the weaver exactly what was to be woven,where and how. There was little love lost between Lurçatand the Gobelins manufactory in Paris and it wasinteresting to hear that there his methods were considered

dictatorial, both in the way that the cartoon was createdand in the fact that there was no original art work for thetapestry, restricting the weaver’s involvement in theinterpretation of the design, failing to take full advantageof their particular skills, reducing them to automatons.Ironically, this stance may well have been at odds with themedieval tapestries he so well admired.

Modern weavers at Gobelins are trained as interpreters ofcartoons and are rightly respected as artists in themselves.The weavers are involved in all stages of the tapestryincluding the creation of the cartoon from the originalartwork and selection of the palette. The cartoons are nowcreated digitally, and with the haute lisse looms thecartoon was kept behind the weaver, visible through amirror beyond the warp. The design is periodically inkeddirectly onto the warp with the aid of a tracing taken fromthe cartoon. This step was omitted with the basse lisselooms as the cartoon was kept beneath the warp and theweaver worked directly from it. The original artwork andsamples are available close to the loom and are constantlyreferred to throughout the weaving process.

During the whole of the Fellowship, nowhere were theskills of the weaver as interpreter more apparent than inthe tapestry by Yvette Cauquil-Prince based on an originaldesign by Chagall and now curated in the Madison Avenuegallery of Jane Kahan (9, 10). Cauquil-Prince and Chagallwere long time collaborators and she was given permissionto continue making tapestries from his work after his deathand this tapestry is based on the Baie des Anges.

Whereas nowadays a watercolour might be representedentirely through the use of blending different colours onthe bobbin to imitate how the paints blend and interact(albeit spectacularly), she interpreted the original artworkthrough techniques such as contoured wefts, demi duite,limited chiné and two techniques we are yet to comeacross, hachure and hatching, to create all the energy ofbrush-strokes without actually imitating them. The resultwas something spectacular, something organic, something

seemingly able to circumnavigate the confines of warp andweft. The essence of the original work was capturedwithout merely reproducing it, it kept true to the mediumof tapestry and in doing so created an artwork entirelyindependent from the original. The same energy andtextures were evident in Cauquil-Prince’s interpretation ofa Lee Krasner design curated by Vojtech Blau also in NewYork.

Further back in history we rarely have an opportunity tocompare a tapestry with its cartoon or original art work.But with Scene from the Buzzard, an interestingopportunity exists as a tapestry so similar it must have

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been made from the same cartoon or original artwork canbe found on the walls of the GermanischesNationalmuseum in Nuremburg (11).

It was a bit of a shock seeing a tapestry I had seenelsewhere a year before although I have subsequentlycome to realise there are numerous sections from several

tapestries based on The Buzzard extant in numerouscollections. The Germanisches Nationalmuseum example(11) is much longer than the one in Paris (12), but still,clearly they are based on the same source.

Frustratingly it was very difficult to photograph due to lightreflection on the glass, and the placement of a large

wooden chair prevented close access to the GermanischesNationalmuseum tapestry. However should theopportunity ever arise it would make an interesting studyto compare the two scenes (and indeed the others extant)to see what precisely the weaver was at liberty toimprovise or not.

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Justice Disarmed by Mercy, Brussels, 1510Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels, Belgium

The first stop during my Fellowship was the Musées Royauxdes Beaux-Arts de Belgique in Brussels. It wasoverwhelming, my first day proper and I was faced withmore tapestries in one room than I had seen in my entirelife, and there was room after room of them.

Amongst them were a pair of tapestries from the seriesTriumph of the Seven Virtues and I was to come acrossother examples throughout my travels. The tapestry isdominated by three main scenes, enthroned Christ at thetop register and Justice armed with a sword restrained byMercy and with Peace knelt before her, and the object ofJustice’s wrath, a man, fallen into a group of musiciansincluding a lady at an organ.

As we have seen tapestry is, by its very nature, somewhatrigid. It was in an effort to minimise its ‘blocky’ lines thatsetts became increasingly finer. But still, without thatfluidity of paint or pencil, modelling shapes, giving themthe illusion of a three-dimensional form, is all the more

difficult. In an effort to achieve it, weavers used a methodnot unfamiliar to other mediums such as engraving, but bynecessity developed it to a spectacular degree.

When using hachure or battage the weaver creates a seriesof regular stepped tongues of one colour which piercesinto another. The weavers were able to use this techniqueto extraordinary lengths and although it was often used inother contexts, this is best demonstrated in its use todepict the flow, volume, dips and billows of drapery. In theexamples shown overleaf from Justice Disarmed by Mercy(1-3) Humanity surprised by the Seven Deadly Sins (5), andChrist is Born as Man’s Redeemer (6) all woven in Brusselsin the first decades of the sixteenth century, astonishingeffects are created just by manipulating the length of thetongues, the number and shape of the steps used to createthem, their frequency and density, the number of colours,as well as the root of the hachures, whether a line, shapeor other hachure or series of them. Some of these tonguesare referred to as regular hachure and are triangular in

shape caused by steps on either side of the tongue,whereas in irregular hachure only one side is stepped.

Whilst the steps are visible close up, from a distance theycreate the illusion of a middle ground of colour, giving theillusion of shading; denser hachures creating darker shades,thinner hachures creating lighter ones. This technique isespecially useful when one’s palette is limited and it issometimes hard to believe the beauty of the fabric is oftencreated using only two or three colours (17).

Hachure can be used in small amounts to give interest to,for example, foliage and flowers. But in some cases theentire surface of an object can be coated in connectinghachure, for example in the dress of a figure fromHumanity surprised by the Seven Deadly Sins (5), and in twotapestries in the Louvre which depict bears and thin,stretched elongated hachures mould the figures (4). Thereis little here in the way of breathing space, but in manycases, especially in tapestries from Tournai the negative

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space is equally important to create the illusion. In thesetapestries hachure is all that is needed to create elementswithout resorting to outlining as well, see for example thecow in a tapestry in Berne (9), a deer head in TheWoodworkers (10), the curve and sheen of armour in ThePassion in Brussels (8) and from the same piece an armorialboss shows what can be achieved with effectively littlemore than lines (7) (I will add that I had been unaware of agreat sword fight that took place at the foot of the cross, Iwas grateful to this tapestry for enlightening me). TheHunter’s Picnic in the Louvre was a particular favourite andI think that is down to the hachure in the figures, and howbold and solid and rounded it makes the figures (18, 21).

Whilst the hachure in these examples is obvious, in adepiction of the Lamentation in the Louvre the degree ofdelicacy that can be achieved through hachure is evidentand is here very gently used to form the features of thebody of the Christ (16). I will just add here that although Iam not a religious person, and in fact don’t believe in anyGod, there were several times one came across a tapestrywhere one could see it was not just the result of toil andartistry, but also, as in the case of this tapestry, an act offaith.

As the depiction of ever more luxurious fabrics became thenorm, hachure had to learn to work in harmony with thepatterning, behind the scenes as it were, still giving a senseof volume and flow. This is particularly evident in thetapestries of The Hunt of the Unicorn, The Lady and theUnicorn cycle and a figure I have come to know as JazzHands, but is otherwise the unfortunately possessedprincess in a tapestry depicting the Life of St Stephen in theMusée National du Moyen Âge. As a weaver, I won’t lie,the complexity here makes my eyes water (19).

Whilst the hachure is often used quite formally as in someof these examples, in the drapery of the Apocalypse ofAngers hachure is used with similar colours with shorttongues more informally alongside chiné and solid lines ofslit weaving which define the shapes of the cloth and its

folds (11-13). Hatching is also used alongside hachure,hatching being a technique where the interchange occursregularly or randomly without the formalised steps. Stripesalso contribute to the depiction of the clothing and all withthe ease of execution typical of its supreme weavers.Longer more formal patterns of hachure were used todefine the landscaping encasing flora and to create largerlandscaping shapes. This was also the case in numeroustapestries from Nuremberg.

However in the German tapestries, when it came torendering the folds of clothing this was dominated byrayure or stripes (and occasionally demi duite), bold linesdisintegrating into thinner ones (14). The effect createdwas one of pleating and a beautiful rhythm was often theresult. It can also be seen in the goblet sitting on the tableof the Last Supper in the tapestry from Munich (20). Whenhachure was used they were often short fat spikes and atan angle creating a rather jarring effect. These tapestries

were considerably smaller than their French or Belgiancounterparts and hachure can require a lot of warp widthto make them work well, building up the steps and workingperpendicular to the warp.

Another method seen of shading, although far lessfrequently was chequerboarding, here in The YoungHercules, small squares were used to break up one colourwith another (15). In this particular example it was usedalongside hachure and I am not entirely sure the point of it,but it is worth noting that it did not take long to pick up ona shared vocabulary when weaving particular fabrics.Chequerboarding was frequently used on hats, whethershaded or not, presumably indicating a common material -felt perhaps, or wool (22). Similarly satin was depicted inwavy concentric shapes (23), velvet in very dark colourswith a margin of a slightly lighter tone woven in connectingblocks (24), armour as rows of crescent shapes.

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No doubt these are all based on conventions of the time inother media too, but it was interesting to come across thesame patterns in different tapestries from different areasand times.

Hachure takes time, the weaver may find themselves

having to build across the tapestry almost row by rowbecause everything becomes interconnected, it alsorequires a large expanse to do it well unless a very fine settis used. Today weavers have a greater amount of materialsand colours available to them, hachure is less relevant, verydelicate transitions of colour can be created by effective

blending on the bobbin rather than using specifictechniques at the loom. Nonetheless as depicted in thesetwo tapestries at Brussels and many more, it was clearly atthe heart of medieval and later tapestries, and wasrelatively unique to it.

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The Holy Land, Rome, 1644-1656Cathedral of Saint John the Divine, New York, US

I had no intention of visiting the Barberini tapestries at theCathedral of Saint John the Divine. The set, The Life ofChrist, had been woven in Rome in the seventeenthcentury. They were well beyond the date of my sphere ofinterest which was somewhere around the date of theRaphael cartoons. It was these designs that marked theshift when tapestry became more painterly and morefamiliar to those who have only ever have seen a tapestryin a stately home. Of course every European weaver didn’tsuddenly wake up with the knowledge that they had toweave differently, it was a gradual process, and occurred atdifferent places at different paces.

But the Barberini tapestries were much in the news whilst Iwas in New York. An exhibition had recently opened afteryears of their restoration and one goal I had yet to fillduring my Fellowship was to see tapestries in their naturalecclesiastical habitat (6). That the Barberini tapestries werehung inside the church was enough to allow myself time tonip in on my way elsewhere. However I ended up spendinga good part of the day there; from the publicity materialplastered on the wall on the walk up to the church itbecame apparent that the conservation studio which

undertook the work was on site, and despite not having aprearranged meeting the conservators verykindly met with me and took me around the exhibitthemselves (7).

The tapestries were amongst the casualties of a fire thatraged through the Cathedral in 2001. Fortunately half theset were already in conservation, but two still hangingwere pretty much destroyed and others were damagedwith soot (9). After years of painstaking conservation theset was rehung in the cathedral just a few weeks before myvisit (1). These tapestries presented very specific challengesto the conservator and over the years new techniques andapproaches were devised and implemented. It was clearthat these tapestries owe much to the passion anddedication and personal commitment and faith, of theconservators.

One tapestry in particular I liked and have singled out here,is The Map of the Holy Land (2), but for no other reasonthan it reminded me of the Sheldon tapestries which wereonce thought to have been woven at the now ruined abbeyin the town I grew up in. There is some debate as to wherethey were actually woven and some attributed to Sheldon

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are contested. They were known for a few large scalewoven maps and other smaller cushion covers. A smallSheldon tapestry had been loaned to the museum I workedat; I remember the reverence by which it was greeted bymy colleagues but I was at that time too young and toounaware of its significance and too wrapped up in thearchaeology of the site which was, at the time, my interest.

In the Cathedral itself several tapestries were woven fromthe Raphael cartoons at the Mortlake workshops in the UK,established just outside London under the patronage ofJames I in 1619 and which ended later the same century (5).They were not the last Mortlakes I was to see in New York;very kindly I was invited into the textile conservationlaboratories of the Met and amongst some of the

spectacular textiles and tapestries being worked on was aMortlake (4, 10). The UK was never the great manufacturerof tapestries as, say, Brussels, but it was strange tosuddenly come across, and so unexpectedly, a clutch of herpieces.

At the Met I was particularly interested to learn about thework of conservator Christine Carr who is using detaileddigital photography to look at tapestries in an entirely newway, bringing to life the work of weavers normally invisibleto the naked eye. It was interesting that the tapestry whichwas the recipient of her research was a Sheldon cushioncover. I might have done a subtle little fist pump on behalfof historical UK weavers.

The most famous historical manufacturer of tapestries, wasof course Gobelins in Paris (3). It was founded in the 1660sand it was here tapestries were woven for the king (LouisXIV) along side a workshop in Beauvais which madetapestries for private buyers. These two workshops, as wellas the carpet manufacture at Savonnerie, were broughtunder the banner of the Mobilier National in the 1930s andthey now produce tapestries and carpets for governmentbuildings and diplomatic gifts. As the work on the loomsare government commissions, photography was notallowed inside the workshops.

Artists are approached or invited to submit designs to bewoven. From these a selection are purchased. Interestinglythe artists have no training in tapestry. Whether a carpet ora tapestry, the same weavers work on the same projectfrom its inception to it completion, undertaking all thepreparatory work including the selecting the colours andweaving of the samples, which are then used to collaboratewith the artist. Interestingly weavers are not given a choiceas to the projects they become involved with. Thetapestries are not for sale, and are instead put in storageuntil needed and thus very often the work is not woven fora specific destination in mind. The length of time it takes tocomplete a work depends, of course, on the fineness ofmaterials and complexity of design, but ranges from 1.5-7

years. The administration counts the number of days ittakes to make a tapestry rather than weeks or months.

The term used to describe tapestry weavers, licier, is takenfrom the term for heddles or leashes, distinguishing themfrom weavers who work on jacquard looms. Weavers aretrained for four years within their speciality technique(carpet knotting, basse lisse, haute lisse). Their time isdivided between theory and practice, the former involvingthe study of design, colour and the history of art, includingthe history of tapestry itself with the aid of theconsiderable collections in Paris. There are twenty-fiveweavers to each workshop, many are young women andwork part-time to accommodate family commitments; thisoften means a tapestry can take longer to weave. Althoughhaute lisse and basse lisse were associated with a specificworkshop (Gobelins and Beauvais respectively), no

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particular technique was favoured over the other; fortradition’s sake, both methods were still in use.

On each loom is a framed notice with the title of the artwork and artist, the sett and the size. Access to the originalimage and samples were available close to the loom.Although it varies, the carpets observed were woven at10epc (ends per cm) and the basse lisse 4-6epc, and thehaute lisse 4epc. Only natural fibers are used, merino woolfrom Australia or New Zealand and cotton warp. All yarn isdyed on site and there is currently a range of 2000 coloursavailable. As was done historically, the tapestries werewoven from the back. Constant reference was made duringthe weaving process to mirrors which helped guide the eyeof the weavers between the work in progress, the inkedwarps, the cartoons and the original artwork.

Another studio I visited was the atelier Liciers Angevinswhich was established in 1981 by four graduates of theEcole Supérieure des Beaux Arts in Angers (8). Since the1990s they have been based in a studio provided by thetown, located close to the Musée Jean-Lurçat et de latapisserie contemporaine. It was there that I met with twoof its members, Martine Plait and Michele Le Ru,accompanied by Christine Pradel-Lien, another tapestryweaver who relocated to Angers a few years ago and whokindly acted as interpreter as well as facilitating my visit.The studio is based in a complex with other artists. It wasclear that once the art of tapestry enjoyed much politicalsupport locally, and although this has lessened somewhatthe weavers remain optimistic. A diploma in tapestryrecently became possible through the Ecole Supérieure desBeaux Arts and private workshops with local tapissiers areavailable. It is hard not to be envious of the trainingenjoyed by the members of the Liciers Angevins, as well as,of course, those who work at Gobelins. With the closure ofthe degree course in Edinburgh in the 1990s, little formaltraining in tapestry now exists in the UK.

Weavers at the Liciers Angevin work with children at theMusée Jean-Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, and a

community project is underway at a nearby town. A similarproject took place nearby at Rochefort sur Loire involvingchildren weaving a tapestry; activities such as this areessential to keep tapestry a living element in the townrather than just a historical one. These events and theexhibitions they organise in collaboration with other textileartists are also essential for showing tapestry remains arelevant art form within the contemporary art sphere.

However, nowhere is that relevance more ablydemonstrated than in the work of Brooklyn-based ErinRiley. She has brought tapestry to a new generation, notleast through the use of social media and the internationalrecognition she is rightly drawing from curators andgalleries. She is a prolific weaver whose work focuses onselfies and porn as a reflection of the loneliness and trialsof contemporary women. And although I say weaver, sherefers to herself as an artist who works in wool and cottonto avoid the automatic undervaluing that comes with an artform heavily associated with women.

To her technical craftsmanship is not enough in itself, therehas to be an artistic element too, to make it relevant. Thatmay mean circumnavigating technical rules that may resultin what others see as flaws, but these are part of a wider

creative choice. The technical and the artistic have to besymbiotic, and one cannot be judged either-or. Erin hasbeen criticised for this in the past, although it may well beher subject matter that alienates some, but in manyrespects her work is no different to The Hunt of the Unicorntapestries hanging in the Cloisters not too far away andwhich are interpreted by some as the pursuit of love,except her work is just more up front about it.

She shares my own concerns that there lies a danger whenthere is an upsurge in the interest in a craft such astapestry and yet there is not the training to support it;there can only be a dilution of skills, especially when theyare being passed on by folk who have rudimentaryexperience themselves. Is this a detriment to the form, orshould it be popularised at all costs, whatever the result?But of course everyone has to start somewhere. Butwithout proper training, can there be progression to thelevel of skill observed in historical tapestries? Whilst it isimportant to acknowledge what came before in anyparticular medium, it can be intimating for some who lackthe historical knowledge to put, for instance, tapestries,into geographical, historical and political context. It canmake it difficult for a contemporary artist to connect to thework of their predecessors.

Erin’s work is technically masterful, and her use of thearray of techniques open to the tapestry weaver amazesme daily as I watch her work grow on the loom. She sharesher work on Instagram to over 55,000 followers takingpublic engagement to an entirely new level (12). At manyplaces I visited, attempts were made to explore tapestry ina more practical way, from freely available jigsaws oftapestries scattered about the galleries for younger visitors,simple ‘have-a-go’ frame looms, to more complicatedbasse lisse looms as seen with Le Chant du Monde andBrussels, although it was never clear if they were ever usedin the galleries.

There were also display cases of equipment and yarns usedby weavers. With the Apocalypse samples of the different

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techniques used in the tapestry were available to touch,particularly gratifying for folk unable to touch the real thing.The Barberini exhibition at the Cathedral of Saint John theDivine was supported by information boards relating theirhistory and conservation and their relationship with theCathedral, as well as tools used by weavers andconservators and, alas, burned fragments beyond repair.There were simple looms and materials set up for visitorsto try their hand at weaving and a weaver also came inregularly, working on a small horizontal loom. Andalthough I was heartened when I initially saw theseexamples of trying to engage with the next generation ofweavers, I cannot help but feel it is in the hand of artistslike Erin Riley that tapestry’s future will lie.

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ConclusionsNeedless to say this Fellowship has had a major impact on my work. Immediately on my return from my first leg I began work on samples, exploring the techniques I had seen and their use. Ifocused on faces assuming they would be the hardest to get right. These samples have evolved into a new way of working for me, something I have shared through my blog and social media.The change is perhaps best demonstrated by comparing the work completed before the Fellowship and after; for example No Longer Mourn depicted in Chapter 5 (37) was woven beforethis Fellowship and the sample Resting Bitch Face 2 woven in 2018 (1). The Fellowship has provided a lifetime of inspiration, education, motivation and courage. But below I attempt tobreak down more specifically the major elements that have emerged from the project. Of course in no way am I saying tapestry should be one thing or another, but these are the aspectsthat have had the most impact on my own practice.

Innovation vs tradition

I came to tapestry as an archaeologist not an artist, and soit was with the long view that I approached my own workand Lurçat’s honouring and appreciation of the medievaltradition appealed to me. Of course ideas have moved on,even in Lurçat’s lifetime there was a conscious movetowards the innovative and away from the traditional.Although I embarked on this project with an open mind, Istill find myself, especially when I remember standing infront of the Apocalypse of Angers, feeling that the skills ofthe medieval weavers provide me at least, with a rich veinof information and inspiration. By that I do not meanpastiche, but that there is now a foundation of traditionthat will always be a part of my work.

Technical awareness

I am now far more conscious of what is achievable intapestry, that there is a layer of accomplishment that wasonce vague but now concrete. It is a layer all my previousresearch with the available resources and my ownexperimentation did not adequately convey. It could onlyever have been witnessed through the tapestriesthemselves. I know what is possible, what is attainable, Iknow what to aspire to, and that is now feeding into myown work. Rather than instantly dismissing that level ofskill in ancient tapestries as something beyond my reach, itis something I am striving for, and no doubt will be for theentirety of my weaving life.

The tool box is big

When learning tapestry I undertook numerous samplers ofvarious techniques, but once I settled into a way ofweaving that suited me these were generally filed away innotebooks and I found myself in a rut of using a narrow

array of techniques. I have seen now how using numeroustechniques, albeit in moderation, can hugely benefit atapestry.

Mural remains key

In recent years there has been a massive shift in tapestryaway from it being a mural art. In part this is down tochanges in architectural fashion, but also the shifting oftapestry outside of workshops and into homes. It hasbecome a hobby for anyone to do, and so looms havebecome smaller to fit in with people’s living rooms andtheir leisure time. Everyone has a right to pursue theircreativity in their own way and I would not change that forall the world and in no way do I mean to be dismissive ofthe work of folk who work in small format, but to me I haveseen nothing to change my opinion that mural tapestriesshow off the medium to its very best. For me tapestries areabout awe, and that is lost in the smaller format. I was verymuch open during this Fellowship to challenge Lurçat’sassertions, and in fact was keen to see what it was Iseemed to be missing, but I remain in agreement with him.Naturally tapestry groups have to appeal to a widermembership and small format tapestry is a fundamentalpart of that. But when this is to the exclusion of largeformat work (for example exhibitions restricted to works ofsmaller sizes) it changes the norm. In some quarters thatstrive for inclusiveness is fundamentally changing whattapestry is, and I am unsure if that is a positive thing or not.Large tapestries are cumbersome, as are their looms, they

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take an extraordinary time to weave, they take upexhibition space and gallery space that could be used bymany others. But that is also part of their uniqueness.

Accepting the limitations

In truth, before this Fellowship I was a little frustrated withtapestry. I was always working against it, I couldn’t get it todo what I wanted it to do. Understandable when one can’teven make a vertical line with ease, when one can’t evenput in a free flowing curve without risking the smoothnessof the surface; it was always about compromise andcircumnavigating. It was difficult for me to find a way to beexpressive.

However I have come to realise that by accepting thelimitations of tapestry and working within the confines ofthe medium it is actually far more liberating for me as anartist. The only thing I have been able to liken it to, is thewearing of a corset, we as feminists are supposed to shyaway from them, but actually there is a great comfort inhaving all of one’s bits held in. There is somethingunexpectedly liberating about surrendering one's self tothe warp and weft and what it can do and accepting what itcan't. It was with interest that a friend and textiles lecturertold me that she found the students who tended to selectweaving as an option during their studies were those whoneeded structure to tame and support their creativity,rather than those who were naturally neat andregimented.

One thing I have always fought against is the surface oftapestry, and previously I have used techniques to raiseand break the surface. However following this Fellowship Ihave changed my materials and sett into something muchfiner and am finding an inherent rhythm in the tapestrysurface caused by those incessant ribs of warp, thoseundulations rippling across its surface. And perhaps thatprovides a calmness, a sense or order and regularity andharmony. It is all part of me accepting tapestry for itself.

Less is more

The tapestries that appealed to me most (for example theHalberstadt tapestries and those woven in Nuremburg)were those that were bold in design and with a limitedcolour palette. I am now working with single colours on thebobbin and using the various techniques at my disposalwhen at the loom to get the effect I want rather thanrelying of blends made on the bobbin. Everyone has theirown way of working of course, but for me, when it comesto tapestry I feel one of the most striking things I havelearned is that less is more.

Hachure is also key

Hachure was clearly a fundamental part of the weaver’s kit.Although hatching used to be an integral part of my work, Ihave used hachure rarely if at all. Nonetheless it isimpossible not to be inspired by the technical brilliancethat was achieved when making use of hachure in historicaltapestries. I used it to weave the sample shown here (1)and as I strive towards a more defined and crisp way ofweaving I am determined to study it further and makewider use of it in my own work.

Release as artist

One of the aspects of tapestry that appeals most to me isthat it is the bridge between the technical and artisticspheres. I came to tapestry first as someone interested inarchaeological/historical textiles and secondly as a weaverof cloth. In other words I came to it as a technician, ratherthan as an artist. Although I had always been a creativeperson, being an artist was never something I aspired to be,it was never part of my milieu. Naively when I beganweaving tapestry in an attempt to use it to tell the story Ifound lacking in weaving cloth, I was entirely unaware ofthe journey I would need to take to get to a place where Iwould feel confident referring to myself as an artist.

My technical skills at the loom and my expression as anartist are entirely entwined. One cannot thrive without theother. It is with thanks to this Fellowship I now have thetechnical skills to weave whatever I choose to draw,whereas previously I had - consciously or unconsciously -always drawn what I thought I might be able to weave. Inthis aspect a very heavy pair of shackles have beenremoved leaving me standing before an open field whereanything is possible.

Weaver as interpreter

The Cauquil-Prince tapestry has had a very particular effecton my approach to tapestry. The major drawback withtapestry is you have to work it from the bottom up. Onceyou have woven over an area, the only way to change it isto undo all that lies on top of it, which can be months ofwork. To prevent error I’ve stuck to my cartoons ratherslavishly. However I have become much less precious aboutmerely reproducing that design, and now consider my role,not only as the originator/artist behind the design, but alsoas the weaver who must interpret that design from paperinto warp and weft. Of course this forms part of theprocess of making the cartoon, but the bulk of that has tobe done at the loom itself. The cartoon has become for mea guide, I have learned to recognise that I have the right tooverride it, it is a tapestry I am making in its own right, notmerely recreating the original artwork into wool. It hasresulted in a far more expressive and involved experience, Iam present as both artist and weaver whereas before Iwould have been more compartmentalised, being an artistin the creation of the cartoon and the weaver in itsexecution.

Working practice

This Fellowship has left me with much to consider withregards to my practice, from how I lay out my workroom(for example I have stripped it down to the bare necessities,to help keep a clear head creatively as well as to keep

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organised). I am considering attempting to weave atapestry from the back, although this is apparentlyrequiring much more courage that I currently posses. I amalso looking to source or have made a basse lisse loom.

Experimental archaeology at theloom

This Fellowship was always about medieval techniques intapestry, not design. There is little point in pastiche.Nonetheless, during the course of the Fellowship andconscious William Morris’s apprentices would be set tocopy parts of historical tapestries, I began to wonder ifsome sort of self-directed apprenticeship of a similarnature would be of use to me. This was brought to the forewhen trying to understand better the tapestries ofHalberstadt and I undertook a bit of ‘experimentalarchaeology’ at the loom, weaving in the style of its creator.It proved an incredibly useful and enlightening exercise andone that will be pursued further.

Online catalogues

Although their use is not universal, especially in smallerinstitutions, thankfully the availability of online cataloguesof galleries and museums is making their collections evermore widely available. However when it comes totapestries there can be a lack of useful technicalinformation. For example rarely if ever something as simpleas the sett of the tapestry is included (although this canoften be found in a published catalogue). This is somethingeasy to identify and will instantly convey the nature of thetapestry which would otherwise be absent through alaptop screen (and sadly absent here due to the difficultygetting close enough to measure it). Online images of atapestry are usually quite pointless as so big and detailed awork is conveyed in mere centimetres. There are a fewinstances where the resolution is so good one can zoominto the bead, but these are incredibly rare exceptions. Ofcourse there are times when close ups are included with an

overall view, but identification of that close up will be thechoice of the curator/web designer and not the viewer.Images of the back of the tapestry would also be useful.

A weaver’s perspective

One of the things that inspired this Fellowship was the lackof easily available information about the work of weavers.Most texts about historical tapestries focus on theirpatrons, their designers, their style and subject matter,who owned what and when. All good stuff of course. Butwhat is missing for me as a weaver is the weaver. I am nothere talking about workshops and debates as to what cameout of where, but the weavers in them, the weavers sittingin front of the loom. Of course when it comes to survival inthe historical record it favours the patrons over the humbleweaver, but their work, their decisions, their choices arethere in the tapestries themselves. By understanding whatthe weaver did whilst sat at the loom, can surely onlyprovide a useful insight into that bigger picture. Is therereally such a divide between the two approaches? But justas we need a weaver’s input into art historical approaches,so we as weavers today need to have that historicalcontext and it is on us not to be intimidated or shy awayfrom it.

Photographic archive

A major outcome of this project has been the accumulationof approximately 14000 photographs of 170 tapestries nowcurated by me, each grouped by collection and tapestry.Each image needs to be tagged with searchable keywordsrelating to technique, theme, content and style to make itof use to others. This is ongoing. However it has alreadyproved to be an invaluable reference when designing andwhen I need to consider the nature of tapestry, and whenat the loom and I need help on how to complete aparticular technique or achieve a particular result. It alsohas the potential to be a priceless teaching resourcewhether through workshops or lectures.

Legacy

Overall I am left with a very real sense of legacy. I certainlyfeel now when I am sat at the loom that I am not sat therealone. I am very conscious of the links with mypredecessors and it is actually quite palpable. This isespecially the case if it is the work of a particular weaver ina particular tapestry I am referring to in my own work.

I learned to weave through the informal mentoring oftextile conservators who themselves were weavers albeitof cloth. My training as a tapestry weaver has come out ofthat learning but my ability to be an artist has been anentirely different and far more complicated journey. I havebenefited hugely from life drawing classes at BradfordCollege, the advice, wisdom and support of artists andcraftspeople as well as the opportunities provided by thecreative geographic bubble in which I live (a World HeritageSite and its environs which hosts numerous festivals, artsevents and galleries).

There are pockets of tapestry weavers in the UK whoenjoyed formal training, most notably at Edinburgh. Butapart from courses at West Dean, and ad hoc workshopsand short courses run by people with a wide spectrum ofexperience and skill, there is little in the way of formaleducation. I would not be surprised if many tapestryweavers now, came to it in just such a hotchpotch andself-directed fashion as I did.

The most obvious conclusion and recommendation of thisproject would be to argue for the history of tapestrytechniques to form part of a weaver’s training, but it issomewhat pointless when that training does not exist inthe first place and is unlikely to change any time soon.Perhaps the responsibility has to be on us as individualweavers who are not already familiar with historicaltapestries to go out and talk with our predecessors. To seekout their work, to go out and look, to spend an hour withthem, to see what appeals to you, what its weaver can tellyou, what conversations you might have.

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Recommendations and Future WorkThe next phase of this project will be to put into practice at the loom what I have learned during my research and through further study of the photographic archive. This is, of course,already underway. But more specifically future work will focus on:

Encouraging better online access tohistorical tapestries - that creators of onlinecatalogues include technical information andbetter quality images.

Encouraging the dearth of formal training tobe addressed and the importance andbreadth of historical tapestries to form partof that training.

That the weaver’s perspective be consideredin art historical approaches.

Barriers to mural work to be explored andaddressed.

Ongoing curation and tagging of photographicarchive and exploring how best to make it ofuse to others.

Continue experimental work at the loomexploring the techniques studied and how theyhave been used in the past as well as workingon projects inspired by the Fellowship andshare through workshops, talks and exhibitionsand a full-length publication exploring historicaltapestries with a more practical focus.

Right: Depiction of a tapestry weaver from Adoration of the Magi possibly woven in Bamberg in the latefifteenth century and now at the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich, Germany.

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Appendices

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Crib Sheets

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2018

2017

Itinerary26 February Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels, Belgium28 February Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels, Belgium1 March Musée de la Ville de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium3 March Musée National du Moyen Âge, Paris, France4 March Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France

Louvre, Paris, France6 March Louvre, Paris, France7 March Gobelins, Paris, France8 March Gobelins, Paris, France10 March Musée Jean-Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, Angers, France11 March Châteaux d’Angers12 March Musée Jean-Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, Angers, France14 March Châteaux d’Angers15 March Musée Jean-Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, Angers, France16 March Liciers Angevins and Châteaux d’Angers, Angers, France23 April The Cloisters, New York, USA24 April The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine, New York, USA25 April Jane Kahan Gallery, New York, USA

Antonio Ratti Textile Centre, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA26 April Textiles Conservation Laboratory, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA27 April Vojtech Blau

Cooper Hewitt28 April Erin Riley

21 April Domschatz Halberstadt, Germany22 April Stiftskirche St Servatii, Quedlinburg, Germany24 April Domschatz Halberstadt, Germany25 April Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, Germany26 April Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, Germany27 April Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich, Germany28 April Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, Germany29 April Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, Germany1 May Bernisches Historisches Museum, Bern, Switzerland

Schloss, Thun, Switzerland2 May Historisches Museum Basel, Barfűsserkirche, Basel, Switzerland3 May Historisches Museum Basel, Barfűsserkirche, Basel, Switzerland

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Tapestries StudiedMusées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels,Belgium

The Young Hercules, Tournai, 1480Scenes of the Passion, Tournai, 1445-1455The Lamentation of the Dead Christ, Brussels, 1510Christ before Pilate, Brussels, 1520Saint Anne trinitaire, Brussels, 1510-1520Isaac and Jacob, Brussels, 1534Joseph and his Brothers, Brussels, 1534The Triumphal Cortage, Brussels, 1546-1547The Arrival of the Statue of Our Lady in Brussels, Brussels, 1518The First Apparition of the Blessed Virgin, Brussels, 1518Justice Disarmed by Mercy, Brussels, 1519Humanity surprised by the Seven Deadly Sins, Brussels, 1519Judith and Holefernes, Tournai, early sixteenth centuryScenes Savages, Rhineland, 1495Sheep Shearing, Tournai, fifteenth century

Musée de la Ville de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium

Lady of Sablon, Brussels, 1518Tristran and Morgain’s Shield, Brussels, 1620-1630Martyrdom of St Paul Cartoon and Tapestry, Brussels, 1535

Musée National du Moyen Âge, Paris, France

The Lady and the Unicorn (Sight, Taste, Smell, Touch, Seul Desir), Brussels, ?1500Scenes of the legend of Saint Etiene, Brussels, 1500Life of the Virgin, ? , 1499Giohargius and Tubalcain, South Netherlands, 1500-1520Scenes of the Noble life: Reading, South Netherlands, 1500-1520Scenes of the Noble life: The Bath, South Netherlands, 1500-1520Scenes of the Noble life: Depart for the Hunt, South Netherlands, 1500-1520Harvest, South Netherlands, early sixteenth century

Scene from The Buzzard, Upper Rhine, 1480Departure for the Hunt, South Netherlands, 1500-1520The Liberal Arts - Arithmetic, Tournai, 1520Calvary, ?Brussels, fifteenth century

Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France

Group of Women, South Netherlands, end of fifteenth centuryWild Men, ?Tournai, 1460Peafowl and Children Surrounded by Millefleur, South Netherlands, 1500-1510The Woodworkers, Tournai, 1460-1475The Feast, Brussels, 1520Jesus among the Doctors, Germany, 1510Meeting of Anne and Jachim, Germany, 1510

Louvre, Paris

Royal Canopy for Charles VII, ?, 1430-1440Bear Cub Carrying a Shield Emblazoned with a Coat of Arms, Flanders or France, second halfof fifteenth centuryBears Carrying Shields Emblazoned with Coats of Arms, Flanders or France, second half offifteenth centuryCountry scene with Orange Trees, Flanders or France, second half of fifteenth centuryThe Glorious Virgin, Flanders (Brussels?), 1485Scene from the Story of Esther: Esther and her Train, Flanders, late fifteenth centuryScene from the Story of Esther: Vashti declining the invitation of Ahasuerus, Flanders, latefifteenth centuryThe Last Judgement, Brussels, end fifteenth centuryHunters’ Picnic, Flanders (Tournai?), late fifteenth centuryThe Feeding of the Five Thousand, Tournai, 1500Noble Pastorale: Game of hopscotch and Fruit-Picking, The Dance, Country Concert, MakingWool, Shepherd and Shepherdess, Flanders or north of France, 1500The Legend of Saint Julian, Flanders or Northern France, c1500Tapestry of the Life of Saint Anatoile de Salin: The Miracle of the Water, Bruges, 1502-1506Tapestry of the Life of Saint Anatoile de Salin: Funeral of Saint Anatoile, Bruges, 1502-1506The Lamentation, Brussels, beginning sixteenth centuryTwo Miracles of the Host and the History of the Blessed Sacrament, France, 1505-1518

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Allegorical Scene (1), France or Northern France, early sixteenth centuryAllegorical Scene (2), Flanders or northern France, early sixteenth centuryStory of Jephthah, Flanders, early sixteenth centuryThe Triumph of Love, ?Brussels, beginning sixteenth centuryStory of Gideon, Flanders (Brussels), early sixteenth centuryThe appearance of Christ to Mary Madeleine, Brussels, 1525

Châteaux d’Angers, Angers, France

Apocalypse of Angers, Paris, 1373-1382

Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine,Angers, France

Lurçat, Le Chant du Monde (The Great Threat, The Man of Hiroshima, The Mass Grave, TheEnd of Everything, Man in Glory at Peace, Water and Fire, Champagne, The Conquest ofSpace, Poetry, Ornamentos Sagrado), Aubusson, 1957-1966Lurçat, Le Vent, Atelier Marie Cuttoli, 1931Gromaire, Les bucherons de Mormal, Aubusson, 1988 (cartoon, 1943)Lurçat, Liberte, Aubusson, 1952 (cartoon 1943)Lurçat, Naissance du Lansguenet, Aubusson, 1946Lurçat, Les Quatre Coins, Aubusson, 1943Saint Seans, Orphee, Aubusson, 1951 (cartoon 1946)Tourliere, Vin de Lune, Angers, 1994 (cartoon 1963)Broderie, Le vin du Vertige, Aubusson, 1970Mategot, Le Derrick, Aubusson, 1961Mategot, Le Port, Aubusson, 1967Prassinos, MacBeth, Angers, 1988 (cartoon 1963)Wogensky, Vent Debout, Aubusson, 1970Prassinos, Mai, Aubusson, 1960

The Cloisters, New York, USA

Christ is Born as Man’s Redeemer, South Netherlands, 1500-1520The Unicorn Purifies Water, South Netherlands, 1495-1505The Unicorn is Attacked, South Netherlands, 1495-1505The Unicorn Defends Himself, South Netherlands, 1495-1505The Unicorn is Captured by the Virgin, South Netherlands, 1495-1505The Unicorn us Killed and brought to the castle, South Netherlands, 1495-1505

The Hunters Enter the Woods, South Netherlands, 1495-1505The Unicorn in Captivity, South Netherlands, 1495-1505Hector of Troy or Alexander the Great, South Netherlands, 1400-1410Julius Cesear, South Netherlands, 1400-1410King Arthur, South Netherlands, 1400-1410Joshua and David, South Netherlands, 1400-1410The Falcon’s Bath, South Netherlands, 1400-1415Armourial Bearings and Badges of John, Lord Dynham, South Netherlands, 1488-1501Altar Front with Instruments of the Passion, South Netherlands, 1475-1550Wall Hanging with Pomegranate Pattern, Nuremberg, 1465-1475

The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine, New York,USA

The Life of Christ - Annunciation, The Nativity, Adoration of the Magi, Baptism, TheConsignment of the Keys, Transfiguration, Agony in the Garden, Crucifixion, Rest of theFlight into Egypt, Holy Land, Rome seventeenth centuryActs of the Apostles - The Healing of the Lame Man, The Death of Ananias, The Death ofSapphira, The Blinding of Elymas, Mortlake, 1690s

Jane Kahan, New York, USA

Baie des Anges, Chagall, woven by Yvette Cauquil-PrinceLeger, Les Constructeurs a l’aloes

Vojtech Blau, New York, USA

Helice, Delaunay, 1970Les Arlequins, Picasso, 1954Kladinsky, 1954Transition, Lee Krasner, 1972Dia-Argent, Vasarely, 1971Battle Scene, Bruges, late sixteenth century

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA

The Crucifixion, Germany, 1325-50

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Madonna with Eight Saints, Upper Rhineland, 1550-1600Courtiers in a Rose Garden: A Lady and Two Gentlemen, South Netherlands, 1440-1450Hunting Parks Tapestry - Hunting with a Hawk, South Netherlands, 1515-1535Hunting Parks Tapestry - Hunting with a Hawk and Bow, South Netherlands, 1515-1535The Lamentation, South Netherlands, 1490-1505Shepherd and Shepherdess, South Netherlands, 1500-1530The Holy Family, South Netherlands, c1500The Triumph of Fame over Death, Southern Netherlands, 1550-1530

Cooper Hewitt, New York, USA

Beautiful Ladies, Spain, thirteenth century

Domschatz, Halberstadt, Germany

Abraham Tapestry, Harzvorland, 1150/1170Apostles of Christ Tapestry, Harzvorland, 1150/1170Charlemagne, Harzvorland, c1200Life of Mary (1), Rhineland or Lower Rhine, c1510Life of Mary (2), Rhineland or Lower Rhine, c1510

Stiftskirche St Servatii, Quedlinburg, Germany

Quedlinburg Carpet, Fragtments I-V, 1200

Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, Germany

Funeral Tapestry of the Volckamer Family with the Last Judgement, Nuremberg, c1450Christening and Mystic Betrothal of Saint Catherine, Nuremberg, c1440/1450Enthroned Madonna with Saints, Nuremberg, c1440/1450Tapestry with Games of Love, Middle Rhine, ?Heidelberg, c1400The Wiles of Women, Nuremberg, c1420/30Garden of Love, Nuremberg, 1450/1460Wise Men Engaged in Dialogue, Nuremberg, 1380Scenes from the Legend of Saint Sebaldus, Nuremberg, 1425Seat of Mercy between St Sebaldus and Archangel Michael, Nuremberg, 1410/20Wild folk Feasting and Storming the Castle of Love, Strasbourg, c1420Wild folk Feasting under a Canopy, Strasbourg, c1420Wild Men Storming the Castle of Love, Strasbourg, c1420

Scenes from the Legend of Joseph of Egypt, Nuremburg, c1450/1460Entombment of St Catherine, Nuremburg, c1440/1450Woven Strip with Foliage, Middle Rhine, second half fifteenth centuryWoven Strip with Foliage and Coats of Arms, Middle Rhine, fifteenth centuryWoven Strip with Mythical Creatures, Middle Rhine, fifteenth centuryScenes from The Buzzard, Strasbourg, c1490Funerary Tapestry of the Holzschuler family with the mass of St Gregor, Brussels, 1495Fragment of a Feast Day Hanging from the Church of St Sebaldus, South Netherlands, 1500

Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich, Germany

Coats of Arms, Switzerland, 1380The Betrothal of St. Catherine, the Lord's Supper and the Washing of the Feet, Nuremberg,1450Death of Lazarus, Basel, c1490-1500Wild People around a Castle, ?Regensburg, c1420Coat of Arms of the Family of Diez, Middle Rhine, c1470-1480Virgin with a Unicorn, ?Eichstatt, beginning sixteenth centuryWild People in the Hunt, Strasbourg, c1450Scene at a Fountain, Franken, c1460Unicorn Hunt, Franken, c1460Saint Apollonia and Saint Lucia, Eichstatt, c1520Symbols of the Resurrection, Eichstatt, last quarter fifteenth centurySaint Walburga, Eichstatt, c1520Sending out the Apostles, Eichstatt, c1520-1530Adoration of the Magi, ?Bamburg, c1490-1500Unicorn Hunting, Lower Rhine, c1500Miracle of the Host, ?Regensburg, c1425

Bernisches Historisches Museum, Bern, Switzerland

Adoration of the Magi, Brussels or Tournai, c1450/1460Milliefleur, Brussels, 1446St Vincent, Brussels, 1515Armourial Tapestry, Tournai, 1470

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Schloss, Thun, Switzerland

Burgundian Heraldry Tapestry, Tournai, 1470Krauchthal altar front, Basel, 1440/1450Medallion Altar Front, Switzerland, 1300

Historisches Museum, Barfusserkirche, Basel, Switzerland

Love Garden with Tent, Basel, c1490Five of the Nine Worthies, Basel, c1480/90

Elephant, Lion, Unicorn and Stag, Basel, c1500Six Nobles with Mythical Creatures, Basel, c1410/20Nobles and Wild People on a Falcon Hunt, Basel, after 1488The Enclosed Love Garden, Basel, c1470/80Pledge of Troth and Love Oracle, Strasbourg, c1430Wild People Hunting Deer, Basel, c1468Lovers with Mythical Beasts, Basel, c1480Disappointed and Foolish Love, Basel, c1480Wild Woman and Unicorn Cushion Panel, Strasbourg, c1500/1510Allegories of Love Encouraged and Love Disappointed, Scenes from the Lives of the WildPeople, Basel, c1470

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Glossary

Banderole: A ribbon like shape containing text.

Basse lisse: A horizontal loom, also referred to as low warp.

Battage: See hachure.

Bead: The individual visible weft as it sits over a warp.

Beam: Two rotating beams form part of the loom. On thebeam furthest from the weaver is wound unused warp andon the other beam is the wound the tapestry as it iscompleted.

Bobbin: Holds the weft and enables it to be transferredbetween the warps. Often vast amounts will be in use atany one time. Bobbins differ in shape for horizontal andvertical looms, the latter having a point. Bobbins forhorizontal looms are also called flutes.

Calque: A tracing used in the design and weaving of atapestry.

Cartoon: A full sized representation of the tapestry, cantake many forms such as a line drawing or a painting. It sitsbehind the warp and guides the weaver.

Chequerboard: Colour transition made through the use ofsmall squares.

Chiné: The blending of different coloured threads on asingle bobbin.

Choir: The area of the church between the altar and nave.

Contoured wefts: Weft curved over a previously built uparea, as opposed to being placed perpendicularly on thewarp.

Copts: Christian Egyptians who predominated, very roughly,between the Roman and Islamic conquests.

Cut back: A diagonal line of slits created by one area beingwoven adjacent to another.

Demi duite: A line of dots or beads created by a single rowof weft being laid into the warp. Also known as a pick orhalf pass. Many patterns can be rendered by laying thethreads in such a way as to create columns up a warp andinterrupting it to form chequerboard and honeycombvariations.

Dovetail: A join between two areas of colour, where onecolour penetrates into another over a single warp. Whilstthis incursion may occur singularly, dovetails can also begrouped.

Duite: Two rows of weft create a pass or duite. The twolines of alternating beads creates the illusion of a solid line.

Epc: Ends (or rather warps) per centimetre.

Epi: Ends (or rather warps) per inch.

Floating weft: A weft that travels over two or more warps.

Gobelins: A tapestry manufactory founded in Paris in theseventeenth century.

Guimpage: The wrapping of a weft up a warp, often used tocreate an outline.

Hachure: A stepped tongue of one colour that pierces intoanother creating a blended effect. They may be regular(stepped on both sides of the triangular tongue, orirregular, stepped on one side only).

Half pass: See Demi duite.

Hatching: Tongues of colour that regularly or irregularlypierces into another. They usually lack the more formalstepped appearance of hachure.

Haute lisse: A vertical loom, also called high warp.

Heddle: a device on a loom (often a thread with a knottedeye) through which an individual warp will pass. Theseheddles can be moved en masse through treadles toseparate every other warp creating a gap between them(called a shed) through which the weft can pass. In highwarp looms this is achieved through leashes which areattached to the individual warps and are pulled towardsthe weaver thus opening the shed.

Interlocking: A way of joining one area to a colour toanother, the threads when they meet wrap around eachother like linked arms.

Lamentation: The removal of Christ’s body from the cross.

Lazy line: See cut back.

Leashes: See heddle.

Licier: Tapestry weaver.

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Maquette: Original artwork or smaller preparatorydrawings used in the design of a tapestry and can bereferred to by the weaver during the course of the work.

Millefleur: A tapestry characterised by a background ofmany flowers, foliage and small animals.

Mortlake: A tapestry manufactory established in theseventeenth century near London.

Pass: See Duite.

Petit patron: See Maquette.

Pick: See Demi duite

Passion: The crucifixion of Christ and the immediate eventsleading up to it.

Pile: A raised area of thread created by knots or loopedthreads subsequent cut.

Rib: As the warp becomes covered with weft a ridged orribbed surface on the tapestry begins to form. This may bemore or less prominent based on the warp used, its settand the fineness of the weft.

Sett: The number of warp ends per inch or centimetredefines a tapestry’s sett and thus the fineness of theweave.

Sheldon: A sixteenth century tapestry workshop in theMidlands, most notable for a series of woven county maps.

Slit: When one area of colour meets another and thebobbins turn back without forming a link either throughinterlocking or dovetailing, a slit forms between the twocolours. These can be left or sewn. Slits can also be used tocreate detail in a tapestry.

Warp: The thread (historically usually linen) that is heldunder tension on the warp. It becomes hidden as the weftbuilds up the design over it.

Weft: The thread (historically often wool, but may also besilk or metallic threads) which is introduced by the weaverinto the warp on the loom and which creates the design.

Weft faced weave: The term given to the woven structureof a tapestry, the weft being the visible surface of the cloth.

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