Idylls of the King by Herbert Bone

 

Illustration: Herbert Arthur Bone. tapestry from the Idylls of the King series, 1876-1886.

Herbert Arthur Bone produced the Idylls of the King tapestry series between 1876 and 1886. The series was based on the long poetry cycle by Alfred Tennyson, which proved enduringly popular throughout the latter half of the nineteenth century. These tapestry series were also enduringly popular and were produced over sometimes lengthy periods. Bones series took a decade to complete and was produced by the Royal Windsor Tapestry Manufactory, a rival to William Morris own Merton Abbey works. Morris was particularly irritated that the Windsor works had pre-empted his own ideas for the revival of large scale tapestry production and was vocal about the intervention of the Widow, at least privately, regarding Queen Victoria's benefaction of the Windsor project.

Interestingly the Idylls of the King mined the same territory as Morris and his medieval penchant for romance and past glories. However, Bone was in no way plagiarising Morris, but was in fact tapping into the rich Victorian psyche that saw the King Arthur story as, in some ways at least, reflecting their own age as a form of second golden age. Tennyson and many other creative Victorians who used the Arthurian legends, peppered their versions with medieval interiors and exteriors, even though the legends were set well before medieval England existed. The Victorian penchant for the Gothic Revival in some ways denoted the connection between the two worlds. Although contemporary critics pointed out huge inconsistencies between medieval fantasy and the Victorian reality of the industrial revolution, which included the categorising of much of the English population as raw material, the analogies continued unimpeded. That ultimately the Arthurian legends were a tragedy, reflecting the ultimate failure of the golden age, might well have reflected the Victorian insecurity that underlay much of the bombastic approach to Queen and Empire

The single tapestry illustrated in this article shows a scene whereby Arthur forgives Guinevere. The line of text at the bottom of the tapestry is a quote from Tennyson's Guinevere from Idylls of the King. It reads as Lo! I forgive thee as Eternal God forgives. Farewell. However, the farewell portion comes a few lines after the initial text and is part of the section that reads: But hither shall I never come again, Never lie by thy side; see thee no more - Farewell! Not exactly a resounding forgiveness, but more one that has moral implications and standards attached, something the average Victorian would have well understood, particularly as it involved the moral male and the immoral woman, a moral fault line that ran through much of the era. This is something that should be remembered when viewing Victorian reflections of the medieval, they were only merely reflections. How the Arthurian legends were interpreted says much more about the interpreters than it does about the original, something that will be analysed about our own contemporary interpretations of myth and legend by future generations.

Although the Royal Windsor Tapestry Manufactory proved successful, particularly having Queen Victoria as a near patron, it never quite found itself in the same category as the Merton Abbey works. Although a number of wealthy clients bought from the Windsor works, and the company imported some of the finest French and Belgian tapestry workers, there seems something missing creatively from the project as a whole. Comparing the Idylls of the King series of tapestries for example, with the Holy Grail sequence produced by Morris & Co from the work of Edward Burne-Jones, shows a conservative reticence on the part of the Windsor work, to explore or expand creatively. There was perhaps a little too much dependence on French renaissance style production and finish and not enough on the introduction of an English approach to tapestry. 

Interestingly Morris got the idea for a revival of English tapestry production from viewing the Bayeux tapestry in Normandy. Although the Bayeux is an embroidered tapestry, Morris still felt that a revival of English craft skills for which the Bayeux was personally a representation, was achievable. In contrast, the Royal Windsor Tapestry Manufactory was created by two Frenchmen, Henri Henry and Marcel Brignolas. This is not to imply that either Henry or Brignolas were incapable of creatively rivalling Morris because they were French, it has much more to do with the idea of importing traditional French techniques and staff wholesale, literally reproducing a French company at Windsor, rather than attempting to create a wholly and uniquely English approach as Morris tried to do.

The Royal Windsor Tapestry Manufactory perhaps says much about the importation of techniques and skills into an area with different cultural and historical parameters. Although the Windsor works were careful to use as many English styled themes as possible, it did not change the fact that the tapestries appeared somewhat alien to the English craft system. Morris, on the other hand was exceedingly careful to maintain an approach to the textile crafts that was predominantly English based. By the end of the 1880s, the Windsor works closed because of a combination of overpricing and financial irregularities. Morris Merton Abbey works was still to produce some of their finest work and possibly some of the best tapestry work ever produced in England.

Reference links:

Watching the Approach of Danish Raiders from the English Coast Giclee Poster Print by Herbert A. Bone, 24x32
Royal Windsor Tapestry Manufactory, 1876-90 (Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead historical records publications)
Sketches of the Royal Tapestry Manufactory at Windsor, from "The Illustrated London News" Giclee Poster Print, 18x24
The Pond of William Morris Works at Merton Abbey Giclee Poster Print by Lexden L. Pocock, 42x56
HISTORY OF THE MERTON ABBEY TAPESTRY WORKS FOUNDED BY WILLIAM MORRIS.
A historical guide to Merton Abbey Mills: A stort history of textile printing on the river Wandle at Liberty Mill - now Merton Abbey Mills
Idylls of the King
Dore's Illustrations for "Idylls of the King" (Dover Pictorial Archives)
Legends of King Arthur: Idylls of the King (Tennysons Legends)
The Major Works (Oxford World's Classics)
Idylls of the King - The Passing of Arthur by Alfred Lord Tennyson
Chronic Song Of The Lotus Eaters

Carpet Design by Archibald Knox

Illustration: Archibald Knox. Carpet design, c1900.

The Manx artist and designer Archibald Knox was an extremely wide-ranging designer who produced work in many disciplines particularly in metalwork and jewellery. However, Knox also produced a wide range of design work in textiles including printed as well as carpet and rug design.

Much of his carpet design work is very much in the mould of his metalwork, with highly stylised floral imagery being in some ways subservient to a general geometric quality. The work is often acutely symmetrical, with defined areas of pure colour. Although the carpets may well lack a certain air of subtlety, they are excellent pieces of decorative art work that take the carpet parameters as a canvas, placing an equal emphahsis on both the pattern itself and the framework of the carpet.

However, the example that illustrates this article is slightly different and although perhaps much less dramatic than some of Knox's finished pieces, does have a beauty of its own. The piece is a working illustration produced in about 1900. It was meant by Knox as a carpet design, but whether it was ever produced is uncertain. Irrespective of whether the design was put into production, it is an excellent example of the creative journey between the English Arts & Crafts movement and that of the European led Art Nouveau. The potentially fraught passage in England between the two ideologies of Arts & Crafts and Art Nouveau produced some excellent work, but also a large proportion of unsatisfactory examples that were to confuse and complicate the decorative and design system in England.

From the Gothic Revival and William Morris, the English Arts & Crafts movement had held to the discipline of the acute observation of nature, transposing this throughout the discipline of surface pattern and ornament. Although much of the decorative art produced by the English Arts & Crafts movement was in fact stylised and not truly copied from nature, the stylising to a great extent, was kept at a relatively low level. Morris himself was well aware and made it clear throughout his lecture tours, that natural observation of nature could not be the only factor in pattern work and decoration. Stylisation was an obvious tool to be used by the designer. However, this stylization was always meant to be subservient to the subject, not the other way around.

Many English designers and pattern makers who had been brought up through the system of Arts & Crafts and its philosophy of truth and honesty to both material and subject, had various problems with the European ideal of Art Nouveau. In many respects, the two systems shared a basic belief in the power of nature and used it as the foundation of their respective movements. However, the Art Nouveau system placed much more emphasis on the use of stylisation, to such an extent that often the original subject matter was lost in the convolutions of pattern, so much so that the original natural subject became almost an abstraction. The initial natural inspiration became subservient to the stylization, which to the English Arts & Crafts establishment was a clear anathema.

Although initially dismissed as a European short-term fad by the English, Art Nouveau did persist and became a viable and long-term option for decoration and pattern. Because the English already had a well defined and heavily rooted dependency on nature for its decorative inspiration, much of which came from the Arts & Crafts movement, integrating Art Nouveau with its unique dependency on nature, was problematic. The solution was an inevitable English compromise, the blending of both systems in the hope of producing a uniquely English hybrid. Although much of the blending rarely worked and in some cases proved to be disastrous, when it did come together successfully, it proved to be exceptional.

The Archibald Knox idea for a carpet design proved to be one of those cases whereby the stylisation of European Art Nouveau and the intrinsic sensibility to nature of the English Arts & Crafts movement, proved that both could in fact be accommodated within the one decorative style. To some extent, it could be said that the combination proved to be stronger than the separate pieces. Knox produced an effortless and truly stunning example in his 1900 design. It contains a number of different aspects of character and cultural outlook that do not automatically appear to be compatible, including that of the sensuously organic, the relative closeness to its natural and initial subject matter, as well as having an element of the cautious detachment that is so much a part of the English character. That Knox was able to produce work that entailed all of these seemingly disparate elements and more, shows not a designer that lived for compromise and inclusion, but one that understood the complexity of the natural world, its many features and how that is reflected in the human desire for pattern and decoration.

This one example hopefully shows that the subject matter of the natural world is one that is fundamental to pattern work. Human decoration has depended so heavily on nature throughout its long history that it seems somewhat redundant to state the obvious. However, our dependence on the natural world for both inspiration and survival seems at times to be treated with an element of flippant negligence and even arrogant indifference, particularly when seen in the context of our race towards a near universal urban lifestyle with now over half of humanity living within an entirely urban environment.

The contemplation of the natural world, whether it be through the individual and uniquely aware decorative work of Knox, or that of other creative individuals, disciplines and mediums, is a unique factor of human creativity that should be treasured, developed and maintained for future generations.

Reference links:
Archibald Knox
Journal of the Archibald Knox Society
Designs of Archibald Knox for Liberty & Co.
Art Nouveau Floral Patterns and Stencil Designs in Full Color (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)
150 Full-Color Art Nouveau Patterns and Designs (Promotionals, Displays)
Art Nouveau Designs (Design Source Books)
Textiles Of The Arts And Crafts Movement
Arts & Crafts Movement (Art of Century)
The Arts and Crafts Movement in Europe and America: Design for the Modern World 1880-1920
The Arts and Crafts Movement in Britain (Shire History)
Art of the Celts: From 700 BC to the Celtic revival (World of Art)
Art Nouveau Patterns (Dover Pictoral Archive)

Textile Designs of Dalgleish, Falconer & Co

Illustration: Dalgleish, Falconer & Co. Printed Calico, 1849.

The five designs illustrating this article were all printed by the Scottish company Dalgleish, Falconer & Co who were based in Glasgow. They were produced right in the middle of the nineteenth century, 1849 and 1850, and are an excellent example of good and well-balanced surface pattern.

Although the examples are perhaps a little worse for wear, they are after all samples that are now just over one hundred and sixty years old, they do give a good indication of some of the better decorative work that was available in Britain during this period. Interestingly all are limited in colour range, which perhaps makes them all the more appealing to a contemporary audience as they lack much of what many in mid-nineteenth century Britain saw as normal. The often bewilderingly and aggressively kaleidoscopic range of primary colours, fuelled by the introduction of chemical dyes, was added to the profusion of badly constructed three-dimensional illusional pattern work that was often produced by woefully unprofessional in house teams. The coming together of these two strands, chemical dyes and the industrial downgrading of pattern designers produced some of the worst pattern work ever produced.

Illustration: Dalgleish, Falconer & Co. Printed textile design, 1850.

Fortunately, there were also companies such as Dalgleish, Falconer & Co, who, while fully aware and comfortable with the industrial process, were also aware that finely balanced and harmoniously worked out pattern work was a means of long-term gain, rather than short-term sensationalism. Interestingly, all of the pattern work shown in these five examples is organically based, with no indication as to any gothically inspired motifs, even though this was a period where the gothic movement really started to accrue a powerful fashionability. However, the lack of geometrically based decoration may have more to do with the fact that all of the examples illustrated were intended for fashion and therefore were produced as specific dress fabric.

Illustration: Dalgleish, Falconer & Co. Printed textile design, 1850.

 

It is interesting to note that there has always been an appreciably wide gap between the sensibilities of designing surface pattern for the fashion industry and that for interiors. It is not just a matter of scale, fashion fabrics tend to work on a much smaller scale with motifs being directly proportional to the smaller human figure, it is also a matter of compositional subject and the difference in weight of fabric. Geometrically inspired Gothic motifs and generalised pattern work would have been difficult to have blended with the human figure. However, this has not always been the case and there are areas where the geometric works, but on a much simplified level as in checks, plaids and tartans. However, this did not stop a certain amount of inapropriately bold candy coloured vertical and horizontal stripes being used in fashion. It has to be remembered that mid-nineteenth century fashion was still very much produced on a hand made and largely amateur basis and therefore any fabric could conceivably be used as dress fabric if the buyer so wished. However, a fashion fabric also had to hang well and cover easily and therefore heavy furnishing fabrics were not ideal, as anyone who has ever tried to work interior fabrics into costume will no doubt understand.

Illustration: Dalgleish, Falconer & Co. Printed textile design, 1850.

 

Although this may well put a perspective on the textile work produced by Dalgleish, Falconer & Co, it does not change the fact that the design work is extremely well thought out and in some cases originally imaginative. The last two pieces in particular show an interesting use of positive and negative space with an almost abstracted arrangement, although there are floral sprigs in place on at least the last piece shown. In some respects, there are some aspects of these examples of pattern work that could be reminiscent of mid-twentieth century British pattern work, particularly with the emphasis on the abstracted last two pieces and the imaginatively textured first piece.

Illustration: Dalgleish, Falconer & Co. Printed textile design, 1850.

 

That at least some of these examples could have been placed one hundred years after their initial creation, does really go to show that there is rarely anything new in the realm of the decorative arts, particularly when concerned with surface pattern. However, this does not mean that surface pattern decoration is necessarily, repetitive, cyclical or even plagiaristic. What it does say however, is that the vocabulary of pattern work is interchangeable, dynamic and constantly reenergising both itself and the decorative arts in general as well as the world it inhabits. Pattern has been with the human species since its early development and it will no doubt be still with us throughout our future development. That it comes in a seemingly bewildering amount of incarnations and varieties, crossing all cultures and geographical areas of the planet, makes it all the more attractive and alluring.

Reference links:
The Pattern Sourcebook: A Century of Surface Design
Surface Pattern Design: A Handbook of How to Create Decorative and Repeat Patterns for Designers and Students
Textile Design: The Complete Guide to Printed Textiles for Apparel and Home Furnishings (Practical Craft Books)
Textile Designs: 200 Years of Patterns for Printed Fabrics Arranged by Motif, Colour, Period and Design
376 Decorative Allover Patterns from Historic Tilework and Textiles (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)
Patterns for Textiles
Textile Design Book: Understanding and Creating Patterns, Using Texture, Shape and Colour (Textiles)
Pattern Design: Applications and Variations
Patterns for Textiles (Victoria and Albert Colour Books)
20th Century Pattern Design: Textile and Wallpaper Pioneers
Carpet and Textile Patterns
Historic Textile Patterns in Full Color: 212 Illustrations (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)

Les Ornements de la Perse

Illustration: Manuscript page, from Les Ornements de la Perse by Eugene Collinot and Adalbert de Beaumont, 1882.

In 1882, Les Ornements de la Perse was published in France. It was produced by Eugene Collinot and Adalbert de Beaumont and was part of a general European trend to both document and understand the major and minor decorative cultural styles of the world. Islamic pattern work came in for much attention due to a number of factors including the increasingly aggressive European influence on the Turkish Empire and its provinces leading to a point where France become de facto ruler of much of North Africa. Further east the expansion of Russian influence in Central Asia and the British in India brought both Empires face to face in Iran. Each Empire aggressively forced increasingly unrealistic and unfair concessions from Iran, which had to acquiesce in order not to be divided up between Britain and Russia, as had so many other nations throughout the region.

Illustration: Manuscript page, from Les Ornements de la Perse by Eugene Collinot and Adalbert de Beaumont, 1882.

These and other factors gave increasingly liberal access to European explorers, designers, architects and collectors some of whom admittedly were interested in the novel and exotic. However, others were genuinely interested in the factors that went to make up design, decoration and ornamentation in what had previously been areas of the world with limited or no easy access to Europeans.

With so many publications being produced during the nineteenth century on Islamic decoration, sometimes more emphasis is placed on the authors and their European country of origin than the subject matter that they published. It is always hard to strike the right balance but it seems perhaps because of the beauty of the plates and their subject matter, it would be preferable in this case to concentrate on the illustrations from Les Ornements de la Perse.

Illustration: Borders from manuscript pages, from Les Ornements de la Perse by Eugene Collinot and Adalbert de Beaumont, 1882.

Of the five examples shown in this article three are illustrations of Persian manuscripts, one of a carpet border design and one more showing a decorative panel of a door. These beautiful plates give at least some indication of both the range and technical skills that were available throughout the Islamic history of Iran. All are well balanced, harmonious and have a particular penchant for the use of floral motifs and pattern work that has made the Iranian decorative arts leaders not only in the Islamic world, but in the world in general. Designers and decorators across Europe used Iranian decorative styling across a number of disciplines, but particularly in ceramics, textiles, wallpapers and even book and metalwork design.

Islamic design, architecture and pattern work have been inextricably entwined with European architecture and decorative arts for so long that it is sometimes difficult to extricate and examine the obvious. Two simple examples are the Gothic pointed arch which is widely thought to have first originated with Islamic architecture, although there is still reluctance in certain quarters of Europe to admit to such, another being the more obvious arabesque which has been used constantly throughout European decorative arts history. There are a number of other examples some of which are long-standing while others are more recent developments.

Illustration: Border of carpet given by a Shah of Persia to Louis XIV of France, from Les Ornements de la Perse by Eugene Collinot and Adalbert de Beaumont, 1882.

Owen Jones and William Morris were particularly interested in Islamic pattern styling for their different approaches to pattern and for that reason they were interested in different geographical areas or historical eras of Islam for their inspiration. Jones was interested in developing the idea of pure geometry as a working contemporary base for pattern work. Therefore, he was much more interested in the purer abstract styling of Islamic non-representational work. However, Morris with his lifelong interest in the dimension that the natural world could instil in contemporary pattern work was far more interested in Islamic decoration as interpreted through Iran. Looking at the illustrations shown in this article it is not surprising that Morris found affinity with the complex floral pattern work that is so much a part of Iranian styling. Morris himself tended towards the North Indian interpretation of Iranian decorative arts, but this was not so much a preference as a practical development as Morris spent long hours at the South Kensington Museum which had an increasingly large and developed collection of Islamic decoration from British India.

It is unknown whether Jones or Morris had a copy of Les Ornements de la Perse, although Morris did have a copy of Jones The Grammar of Ornament. However, what is certain is that publications like this one were important factors in extending the vocabulary of decoration and ornament. It must also have made it increasingly clear to those who critically leafed through books such as Les Ornaments de la Perse that decoration and pattern is a complex subject with many overlapping and borrowed innovations and general styling, an increasing number of which were to be designated as originating outside of the European sphere.

Illustration: Reposse work from a door of the College of Shah Sultan Hussein in Isfahan,  from Les Ornements de la Perse by Eugene Collinot and Adalbert de Beaumont, 1882.

It is perhaps wise for us to see the contribution that the decorative arts of Iran had not only on the general region that today's Iran occupies, but on a much wider scale which would include both the Islamic and European cultural regions. These illustrations can only give a glimpse as to the importance that Iran played in the development of pattern, decoration and ornament. That it has indeed been a vital factor in the journey towards today's contemporary pattern work, should go without saying.

I have used the term Iran throughout this article rather than Persia, even though the 1882 book title gives the name Perse. I hope this does not lead to any confusion.

Reference links:
Islamic Decoration and Ornament as seen by Owen Jones
Persian Ceramic Designs (International Design Library)
Persian carpet designs to color (The International design library)
Persian Designs (Design Source Book)
Persian Designs and Motifs for Artists and Craftsmen (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)
Persian Textile Designs (The International Design Library)
Indian and Persian Textile Designs CD-ROM and Book (Dover Full-Color Electronic Design)
Persian Textiles and Their Technique From the Sixth to the Eighteenth Centuries Including a System for General Textile Classification
Western Persian Textiles 18th-20th Centuries
Persian Needlework (Soozandoozi haie sonati Iran)
Persian Calligraphic Designs
Persian Ceramics: From the Collections of the Asian Art Museum
Persian Ceramics: 9th - 14th Century
Persian Rugs and Carpets: The Fabric of Life