Carpet as material, motif and medium
In this special issue of Konsthistorisk Tidskrift, we want to pursue some implications of reconsidering the so-called carpet paradigm. This can provide for new angles not only when it comes to research on the Oriental carpet and work on the carpet as motif and medium but also for demonstrating in a further sense how the carpet – and research on it – can be used as a model to understand art and art histories. The American art historian Joseph Masheck introduced this term in his influential article ‘The Carpet Paradigm’.Footnote 1 His primary aim was to provide an alternative explanation of the development of a Modernist image, i.e., how a decorative logic led to the so-called flat image associated with Modernism and directed against the Renaissance ideal of the painting as window on to the world. The carpet, understood as a flat, patterned surface, served as model for painters at the end of the nineteenth century and was a frequent point of comparison when discussing works. This approach can be developed with a closer look at the carpet.
However, the Oriental carpet was far from being a new feature in paintings – in a way, it constitutes a link through time. Since the Italian and Northern Renaissance and Dutch Golden Age, the carpet has been a frequent motif for painters. It was an element that provided colourful patterns and ornaments that were still little known in the West. The carpet was a luxury commodity that – depicted as a cover on a table, as a rug on the floor or hanging as tapestry or drapery – represented wealth and social standing as well as knowledge. This becomes obvious in portrait and genre paintings. A finely depicted carpet beneath the throne of the Virgin Mary is also a common motif, enhancing her standing and being a part of the painting where the artist can show off his skill. The Oriental carpet was of continuous importance even though it might be claimed that interest peaked during the nineteenth century; in the wake of Orientalism, carpets were a well-established motif as code for the exotic.
While the carpet as motif is a common feature, equally important is another strand related to the problem of translations between media. It is well known that artists have used the textile medium themselves, but also provided designs for craftsmen to translate into textile media. But the carpet and tapestry as motifs and media were not only of interest to artists. In fact, some paintings served as sources for historians. Some patterns are solely known from paintings and have become associated with famous painters, resulting in carpets being called Holbein or Lotto carpet. Despite research on the interrelationship between carpets and paintings, there is still much to be gained in the wake of Masheck's pioneering advance. From the perspective of art history, iconography (to designate the carpet and to determine whether a carpet pattern belongs to this or that regional tradition) has dominated. And from the perspective of research on carpets, there has also been the frequent use of paintings as a visual source since the real objects have been lost or destroyed.
Expanding the paradigm
Modernist art history favoured another model of the carpet, securely wedged within the limits of painting itself. Flatness, one crucial aspect, was considered as having developed from within. This is where Masheck's article comes in as a kind of corrective since he argues that the decorative arts – especially, but not solely, the carpet – were a major influence on the development of a Modernist image. On this account, Masheck's prolegomena is paralleled by art history informed by critical theory with a gender or feminist perspective. Particularly in the wake of the 1970s, interest rose when it came to textiles. Treated negligently as a material and in comparison to acknowledged techniques of sculpture and painting, this exclusion has affected – among others – female artists. Adding female artists to the art-historical canon is the first step in a feminist art-historical account.Footnote 2 The second step in critically re-evaluating art and art history, in general, is the deconstruction of the canon. This step problematises precisely the associations to the applied, to the home, the feminine, the amateur – and other concepts related to the private as opposed to the public domain. Studies have shown that throughout the Modernist era, an active stance against the decorative has been the most efficient way to reach an avant-garde position. And even though gender studies has had an impact on the writing of art histories, and the carpet has returned in contemporary art and entered major exhibitions such as the documenta (13) in Kassel in 2012, the decorative arts still tend to be treated separately.
Articles and background
Following the lead of Masheck, we would like to claim that the carpet can be a major tool, an inspiration opening up alternative contexts, in art historical research. The carpet is not only a motif worth discussing, but it also has been an influential model for artists when it comes to the development of their painterly style. And a closer look at this model function provides for a different, nuanced understanding of Modernism. This is what is at stake in the current issue. We have invited the art historians Maureen Shanahan, Merel van Tilburg and Vera-Simone Schulz to present articles on the subject of the importance of the carpet in the twentieth century. Originally presented as papers at our session ‘Reconsidering the Carpet Paradigm’ at the international conference NORDIK 2012 – the tenth triennial conference arranged by the Nordic Committee for Art History – in Stockholm in October 2012, these articles are revised and fleshed-out versions.
Even though motif and mediality still feature prominently in this issue, the three articles by van Tilburg, Shanahan and Schulz point in the arguably more important direction: the carpet as a model and as a key to understanding various works in new ways. Presented in chronological order, the first article shows that the carpet was an important motif for the Swiss painter Félix Vallotton in his renderings of French interiors around 1900. Merel van Tilburg demonstrates how the carpet indicates the ways in which the relation between the depicted persons is apprehended already in the carpet as a major part of interior decoration and how a viewer's understanding can change due to a reading of the carpet beneath the figure's feet. In other words, to Vallotton the carpet was much more than just a decorative element – it served a function as a key to the narrative aspect. While these readings focus on the carpet within the framed image and traditional painting, Maureen Shanahan addresses the relation between Modernist architecture and the tapestries made to designs by the French artist Fernand Léger. As Shanahan argues, it is no longer a clear-cut relation between floor and wall, carpet and tapestry, but rather a ‘floating’ relation in more than one respect. In Shanahan's article, the categorical formations between decorative and fine arts traditions are destabilised as a historical entity as she chisels out the story of Marie Cuttoli as a patron of the arts and the revival of France's ancient textile tradition through investment in the industry when she commissioned avant-garde artists’ designs for carpets and tapestries.
The important aspect of making is also highlighted in the third article in this issue. In Vera-Simone Schulz's article, the artistic translation of images onto carpets as an intermedial process is focused upon. Apart from covering the scholarly discourse of a rather neglected group of artefacts, she addresses the political dimension of various portrait rugs in Iran and the Soviet Union. Schulz shows how tradition and modernity are brought together in the medium of the carpet and how this is turned into a political instrument – in the article, this discussion is interestingly voiced by weavers. A striking image is found in the classical, fantastic motif of the flying carpet, giving wings to the thought of the carpet taking off, conquering the future.
Interdisciplinarities
The carpet has a congenial interdisciplinary standing that can link the arts. As some literary historians have shown, the relevance of the carpet paradigm can be located in literature as well. The aesthetics of the carpet has been a fruitful inspiration for many centuries. Authors such as Edgar Allan Poe have famously claimed the carpet to be ‘the soul of the apartment’, thereby singling out this element of decoration.Footnote 3 Indeed, the specific structure of the carpet – warp and weft as an interweaving of figure and ground – can be brought to fruition when it comes to a close reading of what constitutes the work at hand – from both a narrative and a formalist perspective. Following a material turn of writing art history, the knowledge of the actual act of making expands the understanding of works of art, design and craft alike. The key word is bodily experiences. The shared experience of, for example, a carpet at home or of actual making may be turned into a model that adds at least one dimension to our understanding of art.
Possibilities
This special issue of Konsthistorisk Tidskrift addresses the return of the carpet paradigm as a means of analysing the carpet as motif as well as medium. It investigates how the carpet functions as a model for a better understanding of the image in general. Of special importance is the fact that the carpet paradigm forms a crossroads for research on images, textiles, literature, decorative arts, iconography, gender, ornament and cultural transfers – to name but a few. The lines of investigation are interconnecting. A nuanced reading of the carpet facilitates a new take on the image, and its prolific status in contemporary art promises to make this an important and fruitful endeavour. There are many examples to be found by artists who use, produce or refer to the carpet and its tradition in various ways. This might be related to a return of an interest in pattern and ornament as well – which always has been closely connected to the carpet. Furthermore, it might be related to a renewed interest in alternative techniques, in using textiles rather than oil on canvas. The particular structure of the carpet, in fact the inseparable combination of material and medium in one object, may be put to work in order to reconsider the image in general. The specific visual logic of the carpet underlines this concern. Hopefully, the articles included here will point towards new ways of reading the arts in the light of the decorative arts in all its material aspects – as integral art histories.
Martin Sundberg and Johanna Rosenqvist
Guest editors
Acknowledgements
Johanna Rosenqvist would like to thank the Departments of Cultural Studies at Linnaeus University and Lund University for granting her the time to see this project through.
Martin Sundberg's research was supported by eikones NCCR Iconic Criticism, Basel University.
Notes
1. Joseph Masheck, »The Carpet Paradigm. Critical Prolegomena to a Theory of Flatness«, Arts Magazine 1976, No. 51, p. 1.
2. Griselda Pollock, Differencing the Canon: Feminist Desire and the Writing of Art's Histories, London, 1999, p. 23f.
3. Edgar Allan Poe, »The Philosophy of Furniture«, Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, May 1840.