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Gobelins Tapestry Factory

Les Portières des Dieux: Venus c.1768

Woven silk and wool tapestry | 335.28 x 287.0 cm (whole object) | RCIN 45255

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  • One panel from a series of Gobelins tapestries, Les Portières des Dieux, depicting Venus, representing Spring, seated on a cloud with Cupid and two swans, holding a dart in her right hand, surrounded by grotesque framework with hounds, game and trophy lower centre within a border representing a gold frame. From a set of the Four Seasons, woven in the workshop of Jacques Neilson after a design by Claude Audran III.

    During the reign of Louis XIV, the finance minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619–83) encouraged tapestry production in France, intending it to rival other European factories. Tapestries hung in both formal and informal interiors. Queen Marie Antoinette’s State Bedchamber at Versailles was the setting for formal court ceremony; it was the site of her four public childbirths, and it was also the stage for daily levées and couchés, where courtiers watched the queen ceremonially awoken or put to bed. However, the room was hung with particularly light and flirtatious floral tapestry, chosen by Marie Antoinette, and replaced three times during her 17 years as reigning queen. Gobelins produced different sizes of tapestry for use throughout formal interiors; some with borders which attempted to imitate the giltwood frames of paintings.

    The factory also produced several series of long, narrow portières, intended to cover doors, but sufficiently manoeuvrable to be drawn back. One of the first and most successful series of Gobelins tapestries was the Portières des Dieux, first produced in 1727, and reworked between 1773 and the French Revolution in 1789. Over 235 examples of the series are known, using three types of border. The images in the series depict the seasons and the elements, personified by the classical gods. Spring, represented by Venus, is surrounded by the symbols of the garden. Watering cans stand at the base of leafy columns, and two putti dabble in a garden fountain. The putti emphasise the growing season for flowers and fruit, with Venus above them, symbolising the love and care lavished on a garden in this season. Pairs of doves and roses reflect the theme of love. Similarly, Marie Antoinette’s bedchamber tapestry included the attributes of Juno, the queen of the gods, alongside trailing floral motifs.

    Text adapted from Painting Paradise: The Art of the Garden, London, 2015.
    Provenance

    One of a group of eight Gobelins panels from the Portières des Dieux series purchased in 1825 for Windsor Castle by Sir Charles Long, on behalf of George IV, from the heirs of the Hamburg merchant, Chapeaurouge. Part of the group of furniture and furnishings restored between 1827 and 1829 for King George IV by the partnership of Morel and Seddon for the Drawing Room. The tapestries were delivered in batches between 5 March and 27 August 1827 and delivered to Windsor 4 October 1827; frames 18 October 1827. Nicholas Morel had formerly worked for The Prince of Wales, later George IV, on Carlton House and the Royal Pavilion at Brighton. Subsequently, he was commissioned to design and furnish Wyatville’s newly built apartments for the King at Windsor Castle. In order to fulfil the contract he entered into partnership with George Seddon III whose family had large and long established furniture workshops in Aldersgate Street in the City of London.

  • Medium and techniques

    Woven silk and wool tapestry

    Measurements

    335.28 x 287.0 cm (whole object)

    362.5 x 287 cm (whole object)

  • Alternative title(s)

    Les Portières des Dieux

    The Four Seasons


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