17th Century Brussels Fruit and Vine Tapestry Pillow

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This exceptional antique pillow is fashioned from a 17th-century Brussels tapestry fragment, featuring a richly decorative fruit and botanical composition. … Read more This exceptional antique pillow is fashioned from a 17th-century Brussels tapestry fragment, featuring a richly decorative fruit and botanical composition. The centerpiece is a large sliced pomegranate, dramatically revealing its clustered seeds in deep red and cream. Surrounding the central fruit are abundant clusters of pale grapes or berries, additional rounded fruits, leaves, and sweeping botanical forms, creating the sense of an elaborate period still-life composition.

The beautifully aged palette combines antique gold, mustard yellow, ochre, warm beige, camel, tobacco brown, cream, muted sage green, teal blue, deep blue, burgundy, and faded crimson red. The rich red interior of the pomegranate provides a striking focal point against the golden body of the fruit, while the blue-green ground and pale grape clusters create wonderful contrast and depth.

Centuries of natural aging have softened the original colors and given the tapestry an exceptionally attractive patina. The surface displays visible wear, fading, thinning, small losses, irregularities, and areas of old restoration consistent with its considerable age. These characteristics contribute to the historic character of the textile and emphasize the authenticity and individuality of the surviving tapestry fragment. See less