Verdure" tapestry; Flanders or Aubusson, 18th century

Verdure" tapestry; Flanders or Aubusson, 18th century.
Wool and silk.
It presents some wear and loss of color intensity, usual in these pieces, but with good conservation, maintaining the visual appeal and historical value.
Measurements: 274 x 187 cm.

Tapestry made in wool and silk that presents a landscape in its interior with a mythological figure in the lower left corner, which can possibly be related to the goddess Hera.

This type of scenes are known as verdure or millefleur. A style characterized by the use of a large number of plants or flowers of different sizes. In many occasions these are arranged in the lower area, and are placed in an ascending way creating a vegetation scenery. While on other occasions it is the representation of realistic scenes whose protagonist is the landscape. It is a very common style in Europe, which began to develop in the Middle Ages.

It is a piece made on a high-warp loom, which is woven by placing the warp and the whole apparatus in a vertical position. Tapestry is relatively fragile and difficult to make, so most historic pieces are intended to hang vertically on a wall, or sometimes horizontally on a piece of furniture such as a table or bed. In some periods, smaller pieces, often long and narrow, were made and used as borders for other textiles. Thus, European tapestries are usually made to be viewed only from one side and often have a plain lining added to the back.