Description:
Three panels of Chinese painted plain weave white silk (totalling 15 1/2 yards) decorated with floral sprays and chains in red, pink, green, blue, brown, purple, orange, yellow, and silver. By 2,700 B.C. the Chinese domesticated silkworms (Bombyx mori) and used their cocoons to produce silk cloth. After weaving the silk threads into fabric, the final product was lightweight, lustrous, and supple. Many techniques further embellished silk, and one popular decoration was painting. The Chinese typically used animal and plant glues as binding or thickening agents for the mineral pigments. Also the use of silver in outlines and as accents to floral motifs appears to be unique to Chinese painted silks. Chinese painters also used a ground layer of white paint, usually lead white, under the decoration. This length of painted silk exhibits a popular pattern for the Western market, incorporating repeating motifs of small bunches of flowers linked by ribbons and flowing chains of small flowers. A large amount of painted silk imported into England and America as furnishing and dress fabrics survives unused. Shelagh Vainker comments that "ready-made fabrics were less usable, particularly for dresses, as the time required between ordering and receiving meant that the fabrics might no longer be fashionable by the time they arrived. It has been suggested that this is what accounts for a small, yet nonetheless surprising, number of lengths of 18th century silk that survive unmade. Chinese silks differed from European examples. Chinese looms tended to be wider than Western versions; widths from selvage to selvage ranged from 28 to 32 inches while western silks usually measured 19 to 23 inches wide. In this example, the selvage qwidth is 29.25". Chinese silk selvage edges are also distinctive, using contrasting colors, and at times contrasting weaves, to that of the fabric's ground color. Unlike their European counterparts, Chinese silks also tend to be very soft, supple, and lightweight.
Label Text:
By the end of the 18th century, choices in textiles proliferated with improved technology and expanded trade. The Chinese who exported rich woven cloth like this unused roll of hand-painted silk, held the highest standard.
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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+F.493 |
