Normans on the Seine
Aubusson tapestry woven in Pinton workshops.
With its ribbon signed by the artist, No. 1.
1961.
Lars Gynning is one of the many artists of various nationalities who were woven in Aubusson in the 1950s-70s, when tapestry was an essential artistic medium.
From a thematic point of view, our cartoon allows the intersection, across the centuries, of Franco-Scandinavian relations through the prism of Viking incursions up the Seine: obviously, the Bayeux tapestry comes to mind.
But rather than a historical-diplomatic testimony from Gynning, the cartoon actually illustrates a song by Evart Taube, the national Swedish poet-bard of the 20th century (whose text appears at the bottom of the composition); apart from the subject stricto sensu, the woven translation of an epic song refers to the great medieval tradition of tapestry, an unsurpassable model for many cartoonists of the time. The aesthetic, resolutely modern and influenced by Cubism, revives the ancient subject.
