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This whimsical, saddled, and fully harnessed but riderless horse was part of a larger curtain or wall hanging of a type popular in the late 5th and early 6th century.
Curtains and wall hangings were used in private homes, as well as in public and religious buildings, to prevent drafts, divide spaces, and provide privacy. The tapestry weave of this piece is ideal for such textiles, as it produces a design that can be viewed from either side.
The complete hanging likely would have had many identical roundels (one is in the Cleveland Museum of Art) in staggered rows on a background interspersed with baskets and birds. These designs are traditionally Egyptian, while the roundel borders of heart or rose petal chains and the stylized trees are adapted from imported Sassanian silks.
H: 16 1/8 x W:17 5/16 x D: 1/16 in. (41 x 44 x 0.1 cm)
medium: wool
Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.
This is a bronze of exceptional quality. When complete, it had a cylindrical handle, probably of painted ivory. The reflecting disk was probably of silver, as are the inlays. The intact mirror was obviously an object of great luxury. Sirens (part bird and part woman) were sea-songstresses whose captivating voices drew sailors off course to their deaths. Sirens also accompanied the dead on their voyage to the underworld. The idea was probably imported from Egypt where human-headed ba birds embodied a deceased person's spirit.
Greece, Corinth, presumably of Corinthian or Argive origin
bronze with silver inlays
Overall: 11.5 x 9 cm (4 1/2 x 3 9/16 in.)
Did you know...
This elaborate siren served a practical function, connecting a separately made handle and mirror, now lost.
John L. Severance Fund
Egypt, First Intermediate period (2123–2040 BCE)
bone
Diameter: 1.7 cm (11/16 in.)
Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust
This manuscript was illuminated by a circle of at least five highly organized manuscript painters active in the Flemish cities of Ghent and Bruges. The principal illuminator was Alexander Bening, who painted the majority of the book's miniatures. Manuscripts produced by this circle of artists are renowned for the decoration of their borders, which typically feature a rich variety of realistically-painted flowers, birds, and butterflies. This prayer book, called a book of hours, was intended not for a cleric, but for the private devotions of a lay person-in this case, Isabella the Catholic, Queen of Spain (1451-1504). Isabella's coat of arms embellishes the book's frontispiece. It is unlikely that the book was commissioned by the Queen herself; rather, she probably received it as a diplomatic gift from someone courting her patronage, perhaps Cardinal Francisco Jimenez de Cisneros. A Franciscan friar, Jimenez was dependent upon Isabella for his advancement, first to the post of Queen's confessor in 1492, and then to Archbishop of Toledo in 1495.
Flanders, Ghent and Bruges, late 15th century
ink, tempera, and gold on vellum
Codex: 22.5 x 15.2 cm (8 7/8 x 6 in.)
Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund
username : "bobtravis",
title : "Assateague Lighthouse",
content url : "https://www.flickr.com/photos/bobtravis/2585892104/"
The Virgin kneels on a crescent moon with her hands in an attitude of prayer. Her head is uncovered, and her hair falls down her back and in tresses over her shoulders. In rendering the folds of the garments, little concession has been made to anatomy.
This piece, like 71.342, was apparently carved in the Portuguese colony of Goa, on the west coast of the Indian subcontinent by a native artist.
Devotional statuettes carved in ivory celebrating the immaculate purity of the Virgin were popular in the 1600s in Europe and this taste spread to the colonies established by Catholic countries in Asia and the Americas. The three most important locations for production of these ivories were the portuguese colonies on the Indian subcontinent (Goa, where the present piece as well as Walters 71.407 were made), the island of Sri Lanka (see Walters 71.341) and the Spanish colony of the Philippines (see for example Walters 71.322).
A square paper label with blue borders on the under surface of the statuette is inscribed in ink: "123."
H: 5 3/16 in. (13.2 cm)
medium: ivory, traces of gilding
Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.
At the center of this small-scale triptych, Saint John and the deacon Prochorus sit in a cave on the island of Patmos where John transcribed the Book of Revelation. With one hand on his text, John looks over his shoulder to receive the Word of God from heaven above. The saint conveys the text inscribed on the page, “In the beginning was [the Word],” to Prochorus, who copies it onto a scroll. This is the opening line of the Gospel of John, also composed by the Evangelist. The outer wings depict the Annunciation, when the Archangel Gabriel, at left, told the Virgin Mary, at right, that she would give birth to Christ. The angel blesses Mary, and she raises her right hand in acceptance of his message. Their gestures and direct eye contact suggest that they converse across the painting. The Virgin also holds a thread that she spins from the hank of wool in her left hand. This detail alludes to a story from the apocryphal Protoevangelium of James, which describes how Mary was among eight virgins selected to weave cloth for the Temple veil. When the Archangel arrived to deliver his message to the Virgin, he found her spinning the purple thread assigned to her. This scene of Mary spinning appears frequently in Byzantine art, both in grand frescoes and mosaics found in churches, and in smaller panel paintings and illuminated manuscripts. The diminutive size of this triptych indicates that it was used for individual, private devotion. The hinged wings fold inward over the central panel, making it compact and portable. The outside of the wings are painted with a large cross that spans the two wings, set against a red background. The abbreviation for “Jesus Christ is victorious” (IC XC NIKA) is written above and below the arms of the cross.
Orthodox Eastern
H: 5 13/16 x W: 8 1/4 in. (14.7 x 21 cm)
medium: tempera and gold on panel
style: Post-Byzantine
culture: Orthodox Eastern
by bequest to Walters Art Museum, 1931.
This armor was developed for the joust-a sporting combat between two mounted contestants. Although all of the elements of this armor date from the same period, they are not all from the same suit. This armor is thus called "composed." It also shows the asymmetry of jousting armor. The participants rode along a wall-like barrier known as a "tilt" with their left sides facing one another. Consequently, armor on that side of the body had to be thicker. Note the large plate (grandguard) over the left shoulder for extra protection. Also, the breathing holes in the helmet were placed on the right side (farthest from an opponent's lance) to avoid injuries from splinters. The bracket attached to the right breastplate is called the lance-rest, a shock-absorbing support designed to accommodate the lance when "couched" under the right armpit.
South Germany, 16th century
steel, leather straps, brass rivets
Overall: 33.5 cm (13 3/16 in.)
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John L. Severance
url from a cool talk on "Creating Alternate Realities" conferences.oreillynet.com/cs/et2007/view/e_sess/12439
Alfred Jacob Miller was a prolific sketcher. He filled many journals with drawings and captions from the time he was studying in Paris and Rome (1833) until the 1870's. The varied interests of Miller are clearly reflected in these sketches: rural sites, studies after Old Master paintings, illustrations of literature, and comical scenes and characters.
This sketch comes from the family album of L. Vernon Miller, which contains works that have passed down through the Miller family directly from the artist.
H: 7 5/8 x W: 9 3/4 in. (19.4 x 24.7 cm)
medium: pencil, ink, and wash on paper
given to Walters Art Museum, 1994.
[1] passed directly from the artist down through his family.
The optical beauty of the patterning and luscious color of <em>Interior with Wallpaper I, II, </em>and<em> III</em> distracts from their ambivalent undercurrents. Across the three sheets, Vuillard creates an airless enclosure in which the wallpaper replicates itself, metastasizing across the surface and threatening the figures partially glimpsed through interior doors. Hidden figures recur in Vuillard’s work, adding an element of the uncanny to familiar settings.
France, 19th century
color lithograph
Sheet: 39.5 x 30.8 cm (15 9/16 x 12 1/8 in.)
Did you know...
This soft, pink interior scene likely depicts one of several Parisian apartments Vuillard shared with his mother and older sister.
Gift of the Hanna Fund