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Seignorial Life : The Bath
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Seignorial Life : The Bath Southern Netherlands
First quarter of the 16th century
Wool and silk
H. 2.85m ; l. 2.85m
Acq. , 1852
Cl. 2180
In 1852, Edmund of Sommerard obtained, from a family from Rouen, six tapestries illustrating the life of a Lord and his lady around 1500. Woven with wool threads, the series is a "millefleurs," characteristic of the Brabant workshops. In the middle of a vegetal abundance, the richly dressed people seem to have been placed with nothing really to link them to each other. The loom setters’ custom of reusing the cardboard already used explains the dry and distant impression of the weaving. In this manner, the figure in the tapestry following the Bath finds herself with a hairstyle and attire different from the next tapestry, the Promenade. On a background of planted flowers a naked young woman has plunged into a bathtub decorated with acanthus and a lion’s muzzle that evokes the art of the Renaissance. The hair and the clothing with its heavy angular folds show the fashions of the Southern Low Countries.
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