Description:
Embroidery picture in silk and wool on a linen ground in brown, red, light and dark blue, green, beige, black, and white of a woman in a red dress keeping her young child close to her using leading strings. All around the two central figures are domesticated and wild animals including two flying black birds and a bird perched on a tree, dogs, deer, sheep, and a bull, set into a hilly landscape, with a Georgian stone house in the background. A teacher or advanced student drew the design onto the linen canvas for the pupil to embroider in tent stitch (sometimes called canvas stitch), using mostly wool with some silk accents. It was probably worked at a school in Boston, and like many needlework pictures, based on a previously published print. Although the exact school is unknown it was possibly worked at or influenced by the school of Susannah Condy (1686–1747) who sold her own patterns for use in tent stitch pieces like this. After Condy’s death, her recognizable style lived on. Her effects, including designs, were sold, and her sister-in-law, Abigail Hiller, opened her own school in 1748. The painted, molded wood frame has applied gilt floral sprays.
Label Text:
This embroidered scene depicts a child guided by an adult – either her mother or a minder – using extensions to the child’s dress. Known as “leading strings,” these ties were often made from the same material as the child’s garment. Leading strings allowed an adult to keep a young one close by. Their use also reinforced the practice of child restraint in movement.
Tags:
mother and child Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+56.167 |
