Chasuble

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The design of this silk textile belongs to a stylistic group historically called "bizarre", with distinctive bold and fantastical foliage, rendered in a rich and sparkling palette- here, coral pink, green, and cream, articulated with silver thread. This silken textile was treasured enough to have been carefully repurposed one hundred or so years after it was originally woven: the silk has been cut and assembled sometime in the nineteenth century to create the current garment, a tabard-like chasuble for a priest to wear when officiating during Roman Catholic church services.

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