| The Triumph of Fame | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Year | 1500s |
| Medium | wool, silk |
| Dimensions | 359.4 cm (141.5 in) × 335.3 cm (132.0 in) |
| Location | Metropolitan Museum of Art |
| Accession No. | 1998.205  |
| Identifiers | The Met object ID: 230011 |
The Triumph of Fame is a tapestry made in Flanders in the 1500s. It is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. [1]
The Triumph of Fame is one of a set of six tapestries, the other five of which are now lost, based on Petrarch's Trionfi . It was created probably in Brussels, by an unknown workshop.
This work, or one identical to it, was bought by Queen Isabella of Spain and Castile in 1504.
This tapestry uses a silk weft that covers the wool warp. In typical Renaissance production style, this tapestry would have been woven using a warp stretched over two rollers, following a painted cartoon underneath it using small areas of color, or hachures, that in juxtaposition form complicated visual effects of vibration and shading. [2]
The six tapestries together depicted "the consecutive triumphs of Love, of Chastity over Love, of Death over Chastity, of Fame over Death, of Time over Fame, and of Religion over Time." [3] The banderole over the figure of Fame, who stands victorious over the Fates beneath her, reads "VETER[UM].SIC.ACTA.PER.FAMA[M].FU[ER]UNT.REDACTA" [Thus the deeds of the ancients were immortalized by fame].
The unicorn is a legendary creature that has been described since antiquity as a beast with a single large, pointed, spiraling horn projecting from its forehead.
François Boucher was a French painter, draughtsman and etcher, who worked in the Rococo style. Boucher is known for his idyllic and voluptuous paintings on classical themes, decorative allegories, and pastoral scenes. He was perhaps the most celebrated painter and decorative artist of the 18th century.
Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads may be visible. In tapestry weaving, weft yarns are typically discontinuous ; the artisan interlaces each coloured weft back and forth in its own small pattern area. It is a plain weft-faced weave having weft threads of different colours worked over portions of the warp to form the design.
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The Raphael Cartoons are seven large cartoons for tapestries, surviving from a set of ten cartoons, designed by the High Renaissance painter Raphael in 1515-16, commissioned by Pope Leo X for the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican Palace. The tapestries show scenes from the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles and are hung below the frescoes of the Life of Christ and the Life of Moss commissioned by Pope Sextus. The cartoons belong to the British Royal Collection but since 1865 are on loan to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
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Pieter Coecke van Aelst or Pieter Coecke van Aelst the Elder was a Flemish painter, sculptor, architect, author and designer of woodcuts, goldsmith's work, stained glass and tapestries. His principal subjects were Christian religious themes. He worked in Antwerp and Brussels and was appointed court painter to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.
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.
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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.
Brussels tapestry workshops produced tapestry from at least the 15th century, but the city's early production in the Late Gothic International style was eclipsed by the more prominent tapestry-weaving workshops based in Arras and Tournai. In 1477 Brussels, capital of the duchy of Brabant, was inherited by the house of Habsburg; and in the same year Arras, the prominent center of tapestry-weaving in the Low Countries, was sacked and its tapestry manufacture never recovered, and Tournai and Brussels seem to have increased in importance.
The Apocalypse Tapestry is a large medieval set of tapestries commissioned by Louis I, the Duke of Anjou, and woven in Paris between 1377 and 1382. It depicts the story of the Apocalypse from the Book of Revelation by Saint John the Divine in colourful images, spread over six tapestries that originally totalled 90 scenes, and were about six metres high, and 140 metres long in total.
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Pieter van Aelst or Pieter van Aelst III was a Flemish tapestry weaver whose workshop commenced by his grandfather was one of the leading weavers of Flanders in the first half of the 16th century.
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Patio from the Castle of Vélez Blanco is a 1510s marble patio; an example of Spanish Renaissance architecture. It is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was originally part of the Castillo de Vélez-Blanco in Vélez-Blanco, Andalusia, Spain. The patio now serves as the entrance of the museum's Thomas J. Watson Library and to showcase the museum's Italian Renaissance statues.
Triumphs is a 14th-century Italian series of poems, written by Petrarch in the Tuscan language. The poem evokes the Roman ceremony of triumph, where victorious generals and their armies were led in procession by the captives and spoils they had taken in war. This was a popular and influential poem series when it was published.
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