The Harvest

Urbanus Leyniers

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Depicting a group of peasants dancing while others load a wagon with hay, this piece belonged to a set of genre tapestries loosely inspired by the paintings of David Teniers the Younger (1610–1690). During the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, the Brussels workshops produced large numbers of these so-called Teniers tapestries from cartoons by artists like Jan van Orley and Augustin Coppens. Featuring genre figures in idealized landscapes, they provided a lighthearted contrast to the grander history and mythology tapestries then in vogue for the staterooms of European country houses. The tapestry is signed by the brothers Daniel and Urban Leyniers, who ran a highly successful partnership with Henry Reydams in Brussels from 1712.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art