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Lot 10 Dα

A Dutch Hortus Conclusus tapestry

Auction 1182 - overview Cologne
15.07.2021, 11:00 - The Exceptional Bernard De Leye Collection
Estimate: 10.000 € - 15.000 €
Result: 87.500 € (incl. premium)

A Dutch Hortus Conclusus tapestry

Wool and silk tapestry. Depicting a fountain beneath a magnificent Gothic style architectural canopy in the centre of a garden filled with animals and flowers (lilies, roses, violets etc.). With a lion in the foreground, a rooster and a stag on the left, an eagle on the right and another deer. With a landscape and architecture on the upper edge. Restored, with additions, backed with linen. H 280, W 195 cm.
Southern Netherlands, first quarter 16th century.

The tapestry in Amsterdam allowed Ebeltje Hartmann-Jonxis and Hillie Smit to identify the entire iconography of this piece, which is filled with Christian symbolism; from the garden motif (Song of Solomon 4:12), to the fountain (Fons Vitae, Revelations 7:17) and the animals and plants.

Literature

Another very similar tapestry is housed in Schloss Burg an der Wupper, Bergisches Museum. Cf. also Hartkamp-Jonxis/Smit, European Tapestries in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 2004, cat. no. 8.