Woman with tapestries
Tapestry with heroes from a fresco from the baronial hall of Castello della Manta
They will whisper over a pale brow, -
"Who is she? Where is her husband, her house?
Only one knight, downcast eyes,
Quietly say: "She's good!".
God's seal on a beautiful forehead,
A mournful burden in an unexpected boat.
"Lady of Shalott" Andreeva N.V.
"Who is she? Where is her husband, her house?
Only one knight, downcast eyes,
Quietly say: "She's good!".
God's seal on a beautiful forehead,
A mournful burden in an unexpected boat.
"Lady of Shalott" Andreeva N.V.
Medieval craftsmanship and modernity. In the material Tapestries and their history! its continuation, directly related to the present, was promised. And yes, indeed, sometimes it happens that the past intrudes into the present in the most direct way, and what comes out of this, this will be the story now.
And it happened that when I was in the town of Goryachiy Klyuch on vacation, I went to wander around the city in order to get to know him. And so I go and see next to the next guest house the entrance to the basement, above which there is an inscription “Gallery of Arts and Crafts”, which, of course, interested me. I go down the stairs, after the heat of the summer southern day, the dungeon met me with twilight and fertile coolness. Loud music was coming from somewhere. In one of the small halls, paintings by Goryachiy Klyuch artists hung on the walls, and crafts and souvenirs of local masters stood in the windows. When I went to the second hall, there was a surprise waiting for me. I just did not expect to see this, and was truly amazed by the picture that opened before me.
At first it seemed to me that I was in the room of some Turkish pasha or Indian nabob, hung from floor to ceiling and covered with carpets. But looking closer, I realized that these were not carpets at all, but tapestries! And the tapestries are well known to me. It is clear that these were copies, but copies of very high quality, and besides, there were a lot of them here, and this always causes a feeling of surprise.
Here it is, this room, or rather, a view of one of the walls, because due to its small size it was simply impossible to photograph it in any other way. On the wall is a tapestry by William Morris "Green"
But perhaps most of all I was impressed by the opposite wall, decorated with a tapestry "Lady with a Unicorn", which is exhibited in the Paris Museum of the Middle Ages ("Cluny Museum"), and a whole bunch of pillows with fragments of images of other tapestries in this series.
Tapestry with a lady and a unicorn and pillows
At one time, my material was published on VO, telling about this tapestry and its storiesso there is no point in repeating it here. But it is worth bringing a photograph of one of the tapestries of this series so that they can be compared here. In addition, let me remind you that one-sided lint-free wall carpets with a plot or ornamental composition, woven by hand with a cross-weave of threads, are usually called tapestries. Tapestries are called only those tapestries that were created at the manufactory of the brothers ... Tapestries. Where did their name come from. But, nevertheless, it will not be a mistake to call the tapestry a tapestry if it is a lint-free one-sided carpet with a plot image.
This same tapestry from the Cluny Museum...
By the way, for tapestries of the late XV - early XVI centuries, with a one-sided background, dotted with leaves and flowers, like the same “Lady with a Unicorn”, their own name was also invented: they began to be called millefleurs, although they did not cease to be tapestries from this.
Just then a woman came out to me - the mistress of this wonderful cool tapestry dungeon, and I simply could not resist asking for an interview with her right away, because meetings like this are rare in the life of a journalist.
This woman - meet Natalya Andreeva against the backdrop of her tapestries
I began to ask her, “how did she come to such a life”, that she settled among these beautiful tapestries, and this is what an instructive story she told me.
It turns out that she has been living here in Goryachiy Klyuch for 34 years and just fell in love with this small cozy town. She worked at the local museum of local lore as the head of the art department, and it also turned out that we were colleagues with her - she had five years of work in the local newspaper behind her back. And not just work: "The Golden Pen of the Kuban" - this is how her colleagues in the workshop, journalists of the Krasnodar Territory, assessed her articles in this newspaper.
She turned out to be an amazingly versatile and versatile person. Well, how, for example, do you like such an activity - collecting archaeological artifacts after rain, since local heavy rains often wash a lot of interesting things to the surface. This is how the collections of the museum, by the way, were replenished. She also worked in historical reconstruction. I sewed old costumes, tried to restore their appearance as accurately as possible.
That's how she became interested in tapestries. After all, this is a ready-made, moreover, the most reliable source of images from the past, where the smallest details of ancient costumes are very well shown. And then Natalya Valeryevna told me a very interesting story that I had not known before. It turns out that the art of tapestry, which reached its peak in the 1834th-1898th centuries, fell into decline by the end of the XNUMXth century and was essentially forgotten. But there was an Englishman, William Morris (XNUMX-XNUMX), who decided to revive the prestige and methods of manual work, as opposed to the impersonal mechanical production of the XNUMXth century.
Tapestry by William Morris "Strawberry Theft" (1883). Victoria and Albert Museum, London
He was especially interested in medieval tapestries, which he admired so much as a child. His first embroideries were quite primitive, but, nevertheless, he, together with his wife Jane, made a whole set of tapestries for his house in one of the suburbs of London. And then one of the works of his wife brought his company an award at an international competition in 1862.
Tapestry "Green" by John Henry Dearle for Morris and Co. (1890). Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
In his opinion, the creation of tapestries was "the noblest of all weaving arts". Therefore, already in 1877, he installed his first loom at his home and wove the tapestry "Acanthus and the Vine" himself in 1879. The tapestry was woven to look like 1885th-century French work, and he deliberately gave it a faded look to make it look like it was XNUMX years old. It took Morris five hundred and sixteen and a half hours to complete this work. Later, together with his daughter Mei, he created sketches for "yours" sets: cushion covers, fireplace screens, door curtains, bedspreads and other household items. And already in XNUMX, Morris completely and completely transferred the affairs of the company into the hands of his daughter.
"Sir Gawain and Sir Uwain in the Ruined Chapel": Tapestry No. 4 from the "Holy Grail" series of tapestries woven by Morris & Co. in 1891-1894 for Stanmore Hall. This version of Morris & Co. was made for Lawrence Hodson of Compton Hall in 1895-1896. Material: wool and silk on a cotton basis. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery
And it turned out that Natalya Valerievna's interest in Morris's work grew into tapestries in general. And then she began to look for an enterprise that today makes tapestries, and found it. And I learned that thanks to modern computer technology, it can be reproduced with detailed accuracy on a special machine with program control. And so she contacted this enterprise and now orders him these or those tapestries to her liking. From this, her collection of trellises based on medieval designs and sketches by William Morris was formed.
“My goal is to bring the best examples of tapestries to the modern audience,” says Natalya Andreeva. “Like William Morris, I believe that art should not only be kept in palaces and museums, but be an everyday part of our lives, surround us in everyday life.”
By the way, you can buy tapestries here at quite democratic prices. The name of the gallery in Goryachiy Klyuch is also a historical reference, Art & Craft - that was the name of the exhibition organized by Morris and his associates.
"Speech of the Warriors". E. Burne-Jones. Morris & Co. Tapestry from the "Holy Grail" series. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery
In her opinion, the tapestry is not just an ornament. It is also a record of history. There are a lot of encrypted symbols in the tapestries that give us food for searching and thinking, in a word - this is a very high art that brings people both joy and knowledge!
“The tapestry can be read like a book, like an ancient manuscript lavishly decorated with images, it contains not only visual symbols, but also fragments of text. There are cartouche inscriptions on almost all of Morris' tapestries, and we see them on the tent of the Lady with the Unicorn. In fact, the tapestry is a syncretic source of information and artistic images”,
- says Natalia Andreeva.
By the way, if you are in Goryachiy Klyuch, be sure to visit her cozy basement on Lenin Street. You can always buy a pillow cover there, or even more than one.
One of the tapestries hanging in the Arts and Crafts Gallery: The Hunt for the Unicorn is a series of seven tapestries that were created between 1495 and 1505. These tapestries show scenes of a mythical unicorn hunt. Today they are in the Cloisters, a branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in northern Manhattan, New York.
In general, I really liked visiting Natalya Valeryevna, and after this visit there was only one thought in my head: how good it is that there are such interesting, enthusiastic and talented people in the world. How much they make our life more interesting and richer in every way.
PS
By the way, she also writes poetry. For example, she wrote a ballad about Lady Shalott, and quite in a medieval spirit!
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