Schmelzzimmer: Glass bead tapestries for interior decoration (original) (raw)

Eighteenth-Century European Glass Bead Embroidery and the Schmelzzimmer in Arnstadt: A Reassessment [text of a forthcoming article] In 2001, the so-called Schmelzzimmer in the Arnstadt Schloss was included in a survey of eighteenth-century glass bead embroidery (“broderie en jais”) for interior decoration [1]. A short-lived fashion, glass bead embroideries were exotic, highly reflective, and the beads, while heavy, were colorfast. Antependia (altar frontals) embroidered in glass beads were not considered in 2001, and the stunning glass bead baldachin for the Doge’s throne in the Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Venice was not known at the time. In addition, several glass bead panels which were removed from their original eighteenth-century interiors have come to light, in the Victor Hugo’s Hauteville House on Guernsey, with Steinitz Antiquaires in Paris and in private collections [2]. What unites all of these embroideries, besides an aspect of mystery surrounding their origins, is the use of glass beads in combination with other sorts of embroidery in wool, silk, chenille or metal threads [3]. By contrast, the tapestries on the walls of the Arnstadt Schmelzzimmer are chiefly executed in colored and patterned silk appliqué and the glass beads are largely confined to marbling effects on the serpentine columns and augmented by the use of sequins. The earliest inventory of the room, from 1753, reports “XXXIV. In dem HauptZimer ist die Tapette mit Schmelz gewebt […],”which misleadingly suggests overall glass beading [4]. This would explain the later emergence of the term Schmelzzimmer. Yet the Arnstadt room is perhaps more correctly an appliquéd room, if not a hybrid that defies simple categorization [5]. Thus, it should be contextualized apart from glass bead tapestries and compared instead to other sorts of secular and non-secular textile interiors, as found in Schloss Favorite and the Schlosskirche in Rastatt and in Arnstadt’s own Mon Plaisir [6]. [1] Maureen Cassidy-Geiger, La Broderie en Jais: Glassbead Embroidery for Interior Decoration, Ijdel stof: Interieurtextiel in West-Europa 1600-1900 (Antwerp, 2001), pp. 59-68 and 307-312. [2] The Hauteville House panels have not been published. As of 2016, the Steinitz panels remain with Steinitz Antiquaires in Paris and were published in a private catalogue by Benjamin Steinitz in 2002, where Cassidy-Geiger’s essay La Broderie en Jais (note 1) was reprinted. Non-secular panels as well as antependia are with the collector Emmanuel Crenne. [3] Whether the taste first emerged in Italy or France is uncertain, though glass bead embroidery was apparently practiced in Germany, Bohemia and Russia, and the beads were presumably available from local producers in all these regions. French or Italian specialists in this style of embroidery might have traveled to other centers to practice their art, resulting in local workshops. [4] I thank Antje Vanhoefen for this transcription from the inventory. [5] Some of the appliqué is also painted. Appliqué is also a feature of the glass bead room in Löwenburg, Kassel, but the dramatic effect of those panels is still largely reliant on the white bead background to the costumed figures. The term Schmelzzimmer is not found in historic German dictionaries and is unique to Arnstadt. [6] For Rastatt , see Staatliche Schlösser und Gärten Baden-Württemberg, Extra Schön/Markgräfen Sibylla Augusta und Ihre Residenz (Petersburg, Michael Imhof Verlag, 2008). Historic festival and theater costumes likewise exhibit similar workmanship and warrant consideration. Presented at the Kolloquiumsprogramm Schmelzzimer Arnstadt, 29 August 2015