Tapestry; Flanders, Brussels, first half of the 18th century.

Tapestry; Atelier Henri II Reydams, Brussels, c. 1700.
"Jupiter and Callisto."
Wool and silk.
Measurements: 245 x 248 cm.
This tapestry represents an episode from Ovid's Metamorphoses: the story of Jupiter. To seduce the beautiful and chaste Calisto, Jupiter adopts the appearance of the goddess Diana. The action is concentrated in the lower part of the composition. The goddess appears dressed in a bright red robe and crowned with a crescent moon. She is surrounded by a blue mantle held in the beak of an eagle behind her. Jupiter can be recognized in the animal whose talons enclose lightning bolts. Callisto, wearing a dress of golden beige, stumbles before the advances of a Jupiter with features similar to those of Diana.
In his reference work on Flemish tapestry, Guy Delmarcel mentions a series, woven on several occasions, known as Verdure, with figures taken from Ovide, histoire de Jupiter. It is very likely that this tapestry belongs to that set and is a work from the workshops of Henri II Reydams, based on cartoons by Jean de Reyff. Hendrik I Reydams and his son Hendrik II ran a successful tapestry workshop in Brussels between 1629 and 1719. Their work was continued in the 18th century by Jacobus Ignatius Reydams. The Reydams family was linked with the Leyniers family and continued to manufacture tapestries until the middle of the 18th century.