examples are the reliefs with which Vasari in the 16th century encrusted pillars and other parts of the court in the Florentine Palazzo Vecchio, built of plain stone by Michelozzo in 1454. Some are of flowing vines and other plants winding spirally round the columns. The English examples of this work are effectively designed, though coarser in execution. The outside of a half-timbered house in the market-place at Newark-upon-Trent has high reliefs in stucco of canopied figures, dating from the end of the 15th century. The counties of Essex and Suffolk are rich in examples of this work used externally; and many 16th-century houses in England have fine internal stucco decoration, especially Hardwicke Hall (Derbyshire), one of the rooms of which has the upper part of the wall enriched with life-sized stucco figures in high relief, forming a deep frieze all round.
5. Sgraffito.—This is a variety of stucco work used chiefly in Italy from the 16th century downwards, and employed only for exteriors of buildings, especially the palaces of Tuscany and northern Italy. The wall is covered with a coat of stucco made black by an admixture of charcoal; over this a second thin coat of white stucco is laid. When it is all hard the design is produced by cutting and scratching away the white skin, so as to show the black under-coat. Thus the drawing appears in black on a white ground. This work is effective at a distance, as it requires a bold style of handling, in which the shadows are indicated by cross-hatched lines more or less near together.[1] Flowing arabesques mixed with grotesque figures occur most frequently in sgraffito. In recent years the sgraffito method has been revived; and the result of Mr Moody's experiments may be seen on the east wall of the Royal College of Science in Exhibition Road, London.
6. Stamped Leather.—This was a magnificent and expensive form of wall-hanging, chiefly used during the 16th and 17th centuries. Skins, generally of goats or calves, were well tanned and cut into rectangular shapes.
Fig. 5—Italian Stamped Leather; 16th century.
They were then covered with silver leaf, which was varnished with a transparent yellow lacquer making the silver look like gold. The skins were then stamped or embossed with patterns in relief, formed by heavy pressure from metal dies, one in relief and the other sunk. The reliefs were then painted by hand in many colours, generally brilliant in tone; Italy and Spain (especially Cordova) were important seats of this manufacture; and in the 17th century a large quantity was produced in France; Fig. 5 gives a good example of Italian stamped leather of the 16th century. In England, chiefly at Norwich, this manufacture was carried on in the 17th and 18th centuries. In durability and richness of effect stamped leather surpasses most other forms of movable wall-decoration.
7. Painted Cloth.—Another form of wall-hanging, used most largely during the 15th and 16th centuries, and in a less extensive way a good deal earlier, is canvas painted to imitate tapestry. English medieval inventories both of ecclesiastical and domestic goods frequently contain items such as these: “stayned cloths for hangings,” “paynted cloths with stories and batailes,” or “paynted cloths of beyond sea work,” or “of Flaunder's work.” Many good artists working at Ghent and Bruges during the first half of the 15th century produced fine work of this class, as well as designs for real tapestry. Several of the great Italian artists devoted their skill in composition and invention to the painting of these wall-hangings. The most important existing example is the series of paintings of the triumph of Julius Caesar executed by Andrea Mantegna (1485–1493) for Ludovico Gonzaga, duke of Mantua, and now at Hampton Court. These are usually, but wrongly, called “cartoons,” as if they were designs meant to be executed in tapestry; this is not the case, as the paintings themselves were used as wall-hangings. They are nine in number and each compartment, 9 ft. square, was separated from the next by a pilaster. They form a continuous procession, with life-sized figures, remarkable for their composition, drawing and delicate colouring—the latter unfortunately much disguised by “restoration.” Like most of these painted wall-hangings, they are executed in tempera, and rather thinly painted, so that the pigment might not crack off through the cloth falling slightly into folds. Another remarkable series of painted cloth hangings are those at Reims Cathedral. In some cases dyes were used for this work. A MS. of the 15th century gives receipts for “painted cloth,” showing that sometimes they were dyed in a manner similar to those Indian stuffs which were afterwards printed, and are now called chintzes. These receipts are for real dyes, not for pigments, and among them is the earliest known description of the process called “setting” the woad or indigo vat, as well as a receipt for removing or “discharging” the colour from a cloth already dyed. Another method employed was a sort of “encaustic” process; the cloth was rubbed all over with wax, and then painted in tempera; heat was then applied so that the colours sank into the melting wax, and were thus firmly fixed upon the cloth.
8. Printed Hangings and Wall-Papers.—The printing of various textiles with dye-colours and mordants is probably one of the most ancient arts. Pliny (H. N. xxxv.) describes a dyeing process employed by the ancient Egyptians, in which the pattern was probably formed by printing from blocks. Various methods have been used for this work—wood blocks in relief, engraved metal plates, stencil plates and even hand-painting; frequently two or more of these methods have been employed for the same pattern. The use of printed stuffs is of great antiquity among the Hindus and Chinese, and was certainly practised in western Europe in the 13th century, and perhaps earlier. The Victoria and Albert Museum has 13th-century specimens of block-printed silk made in Sicily, of beautiful design. Towards the end of the 14th century a great deal of block-printed linen was made in Flanders, and largely imported into England.
Wall-papers did not come into common use in Europe till the 18th century, though they appear to have been used much earlier by the Chinese. A few rare examples exist in England which may be as early as the 16th century; these are imitations, generally in flock, of the fine old Florentine and Genoese cut velvets, and hence the style of the design in no way shows the date of the wall-paper, the same traditional patterns being reproduced for many years with little or no change. Machinery enabling paper to be made in long strips was not invented till
- ↑ A good description of the process is given by Vasari, Tre arti del disegno, cap. xxvi.
