Description

Sight

The Sight tapestry wall-hanging is from the famous six Lady and the Unicorn wall tapestries at the Musée National du Moyen Age, the Cluny Museum, in Paris. It shows the seated lady holding a mirror into which the unicorn gazes while resting his front legs on her lap while the lion looks away. The Sight tapestry is now woven in France in 100% cotton and is fully lined with a rod pocket for easy hanging.

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The Lady with the Unicorn tapestries are considered to be masterpieces of French medieval art. If you doubt this, visit the wonderful Cluny Museum in Paris, the Musée National de Moyen Âge, and enter the circular room devoted to these six tapestries. You’ll be greeted by a magnificent spectacle and then you realise that everyone is absorbing them in hushed reverence.

These awe-inspiring medieval tapestries were woven in Flanders in about 1511 with each tapestry wallhanging celebrating one of the senses except for the final enigmatic ‘A Mon Seul Desir’. All were woven in wool and silk, showing a richly dressed lady flanked by a lion on her right and a unicorn on her left both bearing a banner, with a mille fleurs (thousand flowers) background containing animals and birds. They allegorically illustrate taste, hearing, touch, smell and sight. We have a comprehensive selection at Tapestry Art Designs of each tapestry; some full designs, others partial.

Sometimes called the Lady and the Unicorn tapestries, these 12’ high national treasures were lost until the novelist Georges Sands found them in 1844 at Boussac suffering damage dampness and rats. The Cluny Museum purchased the tapestries in 1863, later restoring them.