A panel of early 18th century Bizarre silk

Italy or France, circa 1710-1715.

The ivory silk damask with a supplementary green lampas weft, and brocaded in coloured silks and gilt metal threads.

Textiles of so-called Bizarre design - a term coined by museum director Vilhelm Slomann and used in the title of his Bizarre Designs in Silks of 1953 - were made in several European countries between 1690 and 1720. Richly woven silks, and also chinoiserie and turquerie needlework, were dominated by these highly stylized, almost abstract motifs. Although no direct, single root for the patterns can be determined, the influence of Indian, Japanese, and Ottoman textiles, occasioned by widening global trade, is clear. The mixture of this extravagant abstraction with more conventional floral designs is typical of the second decade of the 18th century.

Similar silks are illustrated in Seidengewebe des 18.Jahrhunderts I - Bizarre Seiden, Ackermann, publ. Abegg-Stiftung Riggisburg, 2000, nos. 145 & 199, and in Baroque and Rococo Silks, Thornton, publ. Faber and Faber, 1965, plate 48a. Another example is in the collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Art https://collections.artsmia.org/art/91699/bizarre-silk-panel-france

The textile 77.9cm (30⅝”) high and 33.9cm (13¼”) wide.

Mounted on linen over a stretcher 82.5cm (32½”) high and 28.4cm (11⅛”) wide.