The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of April 19, 2024

Month of May: Scene of May Day Festival

Month of May: Scene of May Day Festival

1723–1774
(France, Paris, est. 1662)
(French, 1701–1771)
France, 18th century, Period of Louis XV (1723-1774)
tapestry weave: linen warp, wool and silk wefts
Overall: 2841.9 x 454.3 cm (1118 7/8 x 178 7/8 in.)
The Elisabeth Severance Prentiss Collection 1944.133
Location: not on view

Description

Seated spectators and splendidly clothed ladies and gentlemen on horseback watch May Day festivities in this tapestry. In the middle distance, archers prepare to shoot at a bush and bird placed atop a maypole, while more spectators congregate in the receding landscape. A border of rolled acanthus leaves and flower garlands frames the scene. This scene is one of twelve so-called Months of Lucas tapestries, each depicting activities that coincide with a month of the year.

The original “Months of Lucas” was a sixteenth-century Flemish tapestry set that was owned by the French monarchy and mistakenly attributed to Lucas van Leyden during the 1600s. To this day, they continue to be known as the “Months of Lucas.” This original set was burned in 1797 so their gold and silver metal threads could be used to replenish the depleted French coffers.

Beginning in the 1600s, the popular Months of Lucas were reproduced in several different versions under various masters at the Gobelins Manufactory in Paris, the famous royal production center for French tapestries since Louis XIV (1638–1715). The lower right hand corner of this tapestry bears the signature of Michel Audran (1701–1771), director of the Gobelins high-warp loom workshop from 1732–71, who produced this tapestry for a private patron in addition to the other royal commissions of the set.
  • 1944-
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Fenaille, Maurice, Fernand Calmettes, and Jules Guiffrey. État général des tapisseries de la Manufacture des Gobelins depuis son origine jusqu'a jours, 1600-1900. Paris: Imprimerie nationale, Hachette, 1903. books.google.fr
    Ffoulke, Charles Mather, Sarah Cushing Ffoulke, Glenn Brown, and Ernest Verlant. The Ffoulke Collection of Tapestries. New York: Priv. Print, 1913. archive.org
    Hunter, George Leland. "The Loan Exhibition of Tapestries." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 5, no. 8/9 (1918): 63-87. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25136215 65 www.jstor.org
    Hunter, George Leland. “The Loan Exhibition of Tapestries.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art. (October-November, 1918), 63-66 63-66
    Hunter, George Leland. Loan Exhibition of Tapestries. Cleveland Museum of Art. October 5th-December 1st 1918. archive.org
    Hunter, George Leland. “The Cleveland Tapestry Exhibition” in The Art World & Arts & Decoration (November 1918) 25-28. 25-28 books.google.com
    Hunter, George Leland. The Practical Book of Tapestries. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott company, 1925. 120
    Heinrich, Göbel,[Editor]. Wandteppiche (II. Teil, Band 1): Die romanischen Länder: Die Wandteppiche und ihre Manufakturen in Frankreich, Italien, Spanien und Portugal [Tapestries (Part II, Volume 1): The Romanesque countries: Tapestries and their factories in France, Italy, Spain and Portugal]. Leipzig: Klinkhardt & Biermann, 1928. 143-45 digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de
    Underhill, Gertrude. “Tapestries and Embroideries,” in Catalogue of the Elisabeth Severance Prentiss Collection. Cleveland Museum of Art, 1944.
    Catalogue of the Elisabeth Severance Prentiss collection : bequest of Elisabeth Severance Prentiss, 1944. [Cleveland]: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1944. Published as: Tapestry: Month of May Mentioned: p. 66; Reproduced: XXIII archive.org
    Underhill, Gertrude. “Tapestries,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art (June 1944), 102-103. 102 www.jstor.org
    Ward, Evelyn Svec. "Four Seasons Tapestries from Gobelins." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 40, no. 6 (1953): 113-19. 113-119
    Standen, Edith A. "Drawings for the "Months of Lucas" Tapestry Series." Master Drawings 9, no. 1 (1971): 3-80. www.jstor.org
    Standen, Edith Appleton. European Post-Medieval Tapestries and Related Hangings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: The Museum, 1985. 344
    Wojciechowski, Jerzy. ""May" and "August": Two Drawings by the Master of the Months of Lucas." Master Drawings 33, no. 4 (1995): 410-13. www.jstor.org
    Standen, Edith Appleton and Janet Arnold. "The Comte de Toulouse's 'Months of Lucas' Gobelins Tapestries: Sixteenth-Century Designs with Eighteenth-Century Additions," Metropolitan Museum Journal. (1996), 59-79. www.jstor.org
    Mironneau, Paul. Musée national du Château de Pau. Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, 2003.
    Vittet, Jean, and Marc Walter. Les Gobelins au siècle des Lumières: un âge d'or de la manufacture royale. 2014.
    Hunter, George Leland. "The Cleveland Tapestry Exhibition." The American Magazine of Art 10, no. 4 (1919): 129-37. www.jstor.org
    Crick-Kuntziger, Marthe, “L’énigme des ‘Mois de Lucas,’” Actes du XIIe Congrès international d’Histoire de l’Art. Volume 2. Brussels, 1930. 497-505.
  • Exhibition of the Month: Chinese Furniture. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 29-December 30, 1946).
    Loan Exhibition of Tapestries. Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH ([October 5-December 1, 1918)
  • {{cite web|title=Month of May: Scene of May Day Festival|url=false|author=Gobelins Manufactory, Michel Audran|year=1723–1774|access-date=19 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1944.133