Design for a Valance in the Style of Louis XVI with Bushes and Garlands of Flowers and Containing Two Decorative Bunches of Leaves, Fruits and Flowers Holding Gardening Utensils and a Straw Hat

Design for a Valance in the Style of Louis XVI with Bushes and Garlands of Flowers and Containing Two Decorative Bunches of Leaves, Fruits and Flowers Holding Gardening Utensils and a Straw Hat

Anonymous, French, 19th century

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Rectangular sheet of paper with a design for a valance from the second half of the nineteenth century, inspired on the style of Louis XVI, forming part of the Neo-Classical Revival that took place in France and Britain from the 1850s on. The style was part of the Classical and Renaissance Revival that took place from about 1850, where the interest on the art and architecture from Ancient Rome and the 15th and 16th centuries was propelled by archaeological discoveries in Greece, Italy and Egypt. Through this style, Classical and Renaissance pieces of art and design were reinterpreted in a variety of forms and motifs, and classical figures, scrolling decorations, strapwork, and grotesques and moresques, became central element in design. This Revival was characterized by the use of design motifs that alluded to Classical Antiquity, including vases and trophies with pastoral attributes, classical figures and cameos, a mixture of real and fantastic figures, and swags and festoons. These swags and festoons comprised garlands of fabric and ribbon, as well as thin bundles and garlands of flowers and husks colored with pastels. The scale of this design is clearly not true to life and it is not unlikely that this drawing was made for a sample book of an upholsterer, to be shown to the customer as one of many different styles to choose from. The design consists of two frames with bundles of leaves of different tones of green, and flowers, some possibly resembling roses, of shades of pink, red, purple, white, and yellow, and garlands of flowers and leaves hanging from the upper part of the design, where a curtain of blue color with tassels of a golden-color lies open to expose the view. In the center of each one of the frames floats a bunch of leaves and tools: on the left, the bunch of leaves is adorned with fruits, some resembling apricots and grapes, as well as a shovel, a blade, and other similar gardening utensils; on the right, the bunch contains flowers, a straw hat, a butterfly net, and other gardening tools. These two motifs might have not been intended to be different in the final product, but could have been options for the customer to choose between them.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Design for a Valance in the Style of Louis XVI with Bushes and Garlands of Flowers and Containing Two Decorative Bunches of Leaves, Fruits and Flowers Holding Gardening Utensils and a Straw HatDesign for a Valance in the Style of Louis XVI with Bushes and Garlands of Flowers and Containing Two Decorative Bunches of Leaves, Fruits and Flowers Holding Gardening Utensils and a Straw HatDesign for a Valance in the Style of Louis XVI with Bushes and Garlands of Flowers and Containing Two Decorative Bunches of Leaves, Fruits and Flowers Holding Gardening Utensils and a Straw HatDesign for a Valance in the Style of Louis XVI with Bushes and Garlands of Flowers and Containing Two Decorative Bunches of Leaves, Fruits and Flowers Holding Gardening Utensils and a Straw HatDesign for a Valance in the Style of Louis XVI with Bushes and Garlands of Flowers and Containing Two Decorative Bunches of Leaves, Fruits and Flowers Holding Gardening Utensils and a Straw Hat

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.