The Story of Troy is a set of seven embroidered tapestries illustrating stories about the Trojan War made by Ming Chinese artisans of Macau in the 1620s. [1] [2] All of the tapestries are connected by a common border design containing Portuguese patterns a pair of phoenixes at the top, a lion and griffin at the bottom, and a triton and serpent on each side. The four corners of each tapestry are adourned by the same coat of arms, identified as an erroneous depiction of the family crest of Francisco Mascarenhas, the first governor of Macau. It is believed, if the identification proves correct, that Mascarenhas commissioned the tapestries to emphasize the legitimacy of the Portuguese presence in Asia represented by Macau after an unsuccessful Dutch attempt to take the city. [1] There are doubts about this identification, however, since it is not known if Mascarenhas would have accepted a product with the wrong family crests, [3] though there are Jingdezhen porcelain bearing inaccurate crests positively attributed to Francisco Mascarenhas. [4]
Despite the classic Western theme, the series of tapestries are laden with Chinese motifs—such as the clouds and waves depicted in the Chinese style, and the presence of lychee, a fruit not native to Europe—reflecting the significant involvement and degree of freedom the Chinese embroiderers had in the work. [3] The hangings make use of cotton, wool, silk, and gold thread, but at some point the gold threads were stripped away for the flesh parts of the figures and replaced with silk satin pieces painted in the Western style. [5] An analysis of the paint revealed that the blue-green pigments were often used in European contexts, but not in Asia; conversely, the white pigments were often found in Asian contexts (specifically Japanese) but not European ones. This suggests that the painted portions may have been the work of Chinese artists who had studied Western painting under the Jesuits in Japan, such as Ni Yicheng (倪一誠; christened as Jacobe Niva) and Yu Wenhui (游文輝; christened as Emmanuel Pereira), students of Giovanni Niccolò. [3]
Four tapestries of the set had belonged to the American art collector Henry G. Marquand until his death, upon which the tapestries were auctioned off. [2] Of the original seven tapestries, three are now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, two are in the Museum of Fine Arts of Lyon, [1] while one was considered to be in private hands until it reemerged in 2024 as an exhibit of the Poly MGM Museum in the MGM Macau casino resort. [6] One remains unaccounted for, being last seen in a 1934 auction in Florence. [1] [7]
Chinese art is visual art that originated in or is practiced in China, Greater China or by Chinese artists. Art created by Chinese residing outside of China can also be considered a part of Chinese art when it is based on or draws on Chinese culture, heritage, and history. Early "Stone Age art" dates back to 10,000 BC, mostly consisting of simple pottery and sculptures. After that period, Chinese art, like Chinese history, was typically classified by the succession of ruling dynasties of Chinese emperors, most of which lasted several hundred years. The Palace Museum in Beijing and the National Palace Museum in Taipei contains extensive collections of Chinese art.
Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Normally it is used to create images rather than patterns. Tapestry is relatively fragile, and difficult to make, so most historical pieces are intended to hang vertically on a wall, or sometimes horizontally over a piece of furniture such as a table or bed. Some periods made smaller pieces, often long and narrow and used as borders for other textiles. Most weavers use a natural warp thread, such as wool, linen, or cotton. The weft threads are usually wool or cotton but may include silk, gold, silver, or other alternatives.
Crewel embroidery, or crewelwork, is a type of surface embroidery using wool. A wide variety of different embroidery stitches are used to follow a design outline applied to the fabric. The technique is at least a thousand years old.
A thangka is a Tibetan Buddhist painting on cotton, silk appliqué, usually depicting a Buddhist deity, scene, or mandala. Thangkas are traditionally kept unframed and rolled up when not on display, mounted on a textile backing somewhat in the style of Chinese scroll paintings, with a further silk cover on the front. So treated, thangkas can last a long time, but because of their delicate nature, they have to be kept in dry places where moisture will not affect the quality of the silk. Most thangkas are relatively small, comparable in size to a Western half-length portrait, but some are extremely large, several metres in each dimension; these were designed to be displayed, typically for very brief periods on a monastery wall, as part of religious festivals. Most thangkas were intended for personal meditation or instruction of monastic students. They often have elaborate compositions including many very small figures. A central deity is often surrounded by other identified figures in a symmetrical composition. Narrative scenes are less common, but do appear.
Chinese export porcelain includes a wide range of Chinese porcelain that was made (almost) exclusively for export to Europe and later to North America between the 16th and the 20th century. Whether wares made for non-Western markets are covered by the term depends on context. Chinese ceramics made mainly for export go back to the Tang dynasty if not earlier, though initially they may not be regarded as porcelain.
Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. (1861–1875) was a furnishings and decorative arts manufacturer and retailer founded by the artist and designer William Morris with friends from the Pre-Raphaelites. With its successor Morris & Co. (1875–1940) the firm's medieval-inspired aesthetic and respect for hand-craftsmanship and traditional textile arts had a profound influence on the decoration of churches and houses into the early 20th century.
MGM Macau is a 35-story, 600-room casino resort in Sé, Macau. Under a sub concession approved by the Macau government, the project is owned and operated as a 50-50 joint venture between MGM Resorts International and Pansy Ho, the daughter of Macau casino magnate Stanley Ho. The sub-concession is one of several examples of new casino construction following the end of the government-granted monopoly held for decades by Stanley Ho.
Kesi is a technique in Chinese silk tapestry. It is admired for its lightness and clarity of pattern. At first, this technique was chiefly used to protect scrolls containing paintings. It was also employed as a support for paintings, later becoming an esteemed art form. This art form especially flourished between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries.
Chinese ceramics are one of the most significant forms of Chinese art and ceramics globally. They range from construction materials such as bricks and tiles, to hand-built pottery vessels fired in bonfires or kilns, to the sophisticated Chinese porcelain wares made for the imperial court and for export.
Brocade is a class of richly decorative shuttle-woven fabrics, often made in coloured silks and sometimes with gold and silver threads. The name, related to the same root as the word "broccoli", comes from Italian broccato meaning 'embossed cloth', originally past participle of the verb broccare 'to stud, set with nails', from brocco, 'small nail', from Latin broccus, 'projecting, pointed'.
The Beauvais Manufactory is a historic tapestry factory in Beauvais, France. It was the second in importance, after the Gobelins Manufactory, of French tapestry workshops that were established under the general direction of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the finance minister of Louis XIV. Whereas the royal Gobelins Manufactory executed tapestries for the royal residences and as ambassadorial gifts, the manufacture at Beauvais remained a private enterprise. Beauvais specialised in low-warp tapestry weaving, although the letters patent of 1664, authorising the company and offering royal protection, left the field open for the production of high-warp tapestry as well.
Samite was a luxurious and heavy silk fabric worn in the Middle Ages, of a twill-type weave, often including gold or silver thread. The word was derived from Old French samit, from medieval Latin samitum, examitum deriving from the Byzantine Greek ἑξάμιτον hexamiton "six threads", usually interpreted as indicating the use of six yarns in the warp. Samite is still used in ecclesiastical robes, vestments, ornamental fabrics, and interior decoration.
English embroidery includes embroidery worked in England or by English people abroad from Anglo-Saxon times to the present day. The oldest surviving English embroideries include items from the early 10th century preserved in Durham Cathedral and the 11th century Bayeux Tapestry, if it was worked in England. The professional workshops of Medieval England created rich embroidery in metal thread and silk for ecclesiastical and secular uses. This style was called Opus Anglicanum or "English work", and was famous throughout Europe.
The Scottish royal tapestry collection was a group of tapestry hangings assembled to decorate the palaces of sixteenth-century kings and queens of Scotland. None appear to have survived.
Byzantine silk is silk woven in the Byzantine Empire (Byzantium) from about the fourth century until the Fall of Constantinople in 1453.
Edith Standen was an American museum curator and military officer, best known as an expert on tapestries and as one of the "Monuments Men" who located and protected art works after World War II.
The Franses Tapestry Archive and Library in London is devoted to the study of European tapestries and figurative textiles. It is the world’s largest academic research resource on the subject.
The Death of Polydorus is one of a set of seven tapestries known as The Story of Troy showing a scene from the Iliad by Homer, here the death of Priam's son Polydorus in book VI, link 290 and book XXIV, line 49. It was produced between 1623 and 1626 and is now in the Museum of Fine Arts of Lyon, as is another piece from the set. They are technically embroidery rather than being in a tapestry weave, but the images of the faces and flesh parts of the figures are appliqué painted silk satin pieces, reflecting a Chinese technique often used for Buddhist banners. The painting may have been done by Western artists, possibly in Europe. It measures 3.7 by 4.9 metres.
The Macau Scientific and Cultural Centre Museum in Lisbon is Portugal's main museum of Chinese artefacts and artworks. Made to document Sino-Portuguese relations, the museum contains over 3,500 works of art including decorative artwork, costumes, a collection of opium-smoking paraphernalia and an important extensive collection of Chinese ceramics.
Bed hangings or bed curtains are fabric panels that surround a bed; they were used from medieval times through to the 19th century. Bed hangings provided privacy when the master or great bed was in a public room, such as the parlor, but also showed evidence of wealth when beds were located in areas of the home where. They also kept warmth in, and were a way of showing one's wealth. When bedrooms became more common in the mid-1700s, the use of bed hangings diminished.
