circa 1520-1525, Flemish; Brussels. The ResurrectionSome of the finest tapestries woven in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries depicted scenes from the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. Cathedrals and monasteries commissioned and bought these tapestries for use in public worship, in which specific doctrinal points, and the life of Christ, were illustrated. These might be on monumental scale, but for private worship, smaller hangings were produced, often rich with silk and metal thread, appropriate to their role as devotional pieces.
In this tapestry Christ is seen rising from his tomb, to the consternation of his guards. In the background, using a device common in such tapestries where various scenes from a narrative are included within the same framing borders, his later meeting with Mary Magdalene is also shown.The tapestry depicts scenes from the Resurrection. Christ rises from the tomb, his right hand held out in blessing, his left holding a jewelled cross on a staff, to which a pennon is attached. Below are the soldiers waking in alarm. In the landscape background on the right the three Holy Women are approaching the sepulchre, and on the left Christ is appearing in the garden to Mary Magdalene. The floating Christ is depicted more as if from an Ascension scene than a Resurrection, but the other figures correspond to the latter subject.
The border is composed of fruit including grapes, foliage, masks and bowls, and roses, richly woven in metal thread and coloured silks on a deep blue ground.
6 to 7 warp threads per cm.Correspondence from Dr Johanna Diehl in 1958 in departmental file notes the relationship between the design of this tapestry and two paintings, which both probably derive from an original by Dieric Bouts. One is a Resurrection (the Ehningen Altar) now in the Stuttgart Staatsgalerie, the other a Resurrection by Dieric's son Albert, in the Mauritshuis, The Hague.
A similar tapestry is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York : Christ has a slightly different stance, there are variant details in the foliage and the inscription, and different borders. Its accession number is 49.7.118; part of the Somzée collection sold in 1901, it passed into Jules Bache's collection by 1920, from whom the museum received it in 1949. It has a woollen warp, and wefts in wool, silk, silver and gilt metal-wrapped threads, with a warp count of 8 warps per cm. It measures 223 x 237 cm. Attributed to the Southern Netherlands, 1515-1525. Cavallo's catalogue entry for the Metropolitain Museum's tapestry (see references) also discusses the V&A Resurrection in detail.
The border of the V&A's Resurrection tapestry is to be found on two other tapestries with scenes from the Life of Christ : The Holy Family with music-making Angels, owned by the Norton Simon Foundation, and The Nativity and Adoration, in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Aspects of the figures and drapery in these tapestries are related to the Adoration tapestry in the V&A's collection, 1-1889.