But that was your Granny's heirloom napkin...

November 10, 2021 9:03 PM

Helena Loermans has been reconstructing textile "canvases" at her lab in Portugal using the high resolution X-ray and optical images collected by art historians and conservators. Canvas is a sturdy plain weave fabric that we'd all consider to be a "blank canvas" on which to paint, but that isn't what's underneath paintings by Velázquez, El Greco, Titian, Caravaggio, and Rembrandt. There's a sedate intro video, but I recommend you start at the reconstruction of The Supper at Emmaus (Velázquez, 1620). Actual art historians have documented these before, but Loermans has been taking the next steps to determine viable weaving drafts and then weaving reproduction yardage. As a bonus: this portrait of the 2nd Earl of Mar was probably painted on a fancy Gebrochene twill tablecloth.
posted by janell (8 comments total)

I did not understand one word of that "fancy tablecloth" link. Society of Complex Weavers, indeed.
posted by Orlop at 9:10 PM on November 10, 2021 [1 favorite]

As a novice weaver, i jumped straight to that link (will watch video after work) and *I'm* struck that canvases for painting could be twill weaves and weaves with long floats, instead of plain/tabby weave! Didn't that comparatively uneven surface influenced the final result or is this because traditional medium like oils are applied thick enough that this is a non-issue? (Now you know I'm not a painter!)
posted by cendawanita at 10:43 PM on November 10, 2021 [2 favorites]

Didn't that comparatively uneven surface influenced the final result or is this because traditional medium like oils are applied thick enough that this is a non-issue?

The cloth is usually treated with a primer first, before painting. Oils applied to bare cloth will degrade the cloth over time. Also, the weave of the cloth tends to disappear visually, as paint is applied is strokes, daubs, splatters, graduations, etc. etc. If you look closely, you can usually still see the weave, but the painting itself visually disrupts the apparent texture of the cloth.

These weaves featured here, to my eye, more closely resemble fine linens, like tablecloths. Linen is also used widely for paintings, so I'm wondering if artists didn't just use what was easily at hand for their canvases, and often just got a bolt of linen..
posted by Thorzdad at 4:11 AM on November 11, 2021 [1 favorite]

... don't worry, it'll come out in the wash.

That Earl of Mar portrait; oh my. ms scruss has, in several major galleries around the world, beckoned me over to portraits like this and stage-whispered "HEID!" in my ear, prompting me to crack up. We haven't yet been asked to leave a gallery, but there have been many Stern Looks.
posted by scruss at 5:01 AM on November 11, 2021

I love that the computer controlled loom these were woven on is driven by a c.1986 Mac Plus.
posted by jedicus at 5:26 AM on November 11, 2021

The complex weavers were -very early- adopters of home computers … and then also the drafts for shaft looms (as opposed to Jaquard with thread-by-thread controls) are pretty simple as programs go. There were a few years where serial ports out to the dobby controllers were relatively rare and the usb-to-serial was iffy but things are mostly fine again now.
posted by janell at 8:05 AM on November 11, 2021 [2 favorites]

Thinking about the patterned tablecloth - could they tell if the cloth had been washed often before being used? Or I suppose you could paint over wine stains, or on the end of a cloth not burned by a tipped candle. What made a piece of beautifully woven linen cheaper than plain wove new? Or were portraits the sort of thing you put your best fabric into to honor the subject?

Or it’s an old version of " you cut paper with the CLOTH SHEARS?"
posted by clew at 9:30 AM on November 11, 2021 [1 favorite]

I was hoping a MeFite historian/ archaeologist/ art historian/ who??? here could tell us that, clew. Conspicuous consumption/display? The availability of table linen as high quality -large- textiles? Just what art patrons had laying around? Recycling?
posted by janell at 2:34 PM on November 11, 2021 [1 favorite]