About This Artwork

Chasuble: Italy, Florence
Orphrey Cross: Bohemia or Germany

Chasuble Front with Orphrey Cross, Chasuble: 15th century; Orphrey Cross: 1401/50

Chasuble: silk, plain weave with silk supplementary facing wefts, bound by secondary binding warps and gilt-metal-strip-wrapped silk facing wefts forming weft loops in areas and supplementary pile warps forming cut, pile-on-pile voided velvet; Orphrey Cross: linen, plain weave; embroidered with silk floss and gilt- and-silvered-animal-substrate-wrapped linen in bullion, outline, satin, and split stitches; laid work, couching and padded couching; orphrey braid: silk and silver-gilt strip wound around silk fiber core, plain weave, open work with weft deviations; fringe: silk and gold-gilt-strip wound around silk fiber core, warp-faced plain weave with extended ground weft and supplementary patterning weft uncut fringe off one edge; lining: linen, plain weave
Chasuble: 126.6 x 70.5 cm (49 7/8 x 27 3/4 in.)
Orphrey Cross: 112 x 57.7 cm (44 x 22 3/4 in.)
Grace R. Smith Textile Endowment, 1980.615

Exhibition, Publication and Ownership Histories

Exhibition History

The Art Institute of Chicago, Agnes Allerton Gallery, "Selected Textile Acquisitions Since 1978," July 10–October 10, 1982

The Art Institute of Chicago, Agnes Allerton Gallery, "Vestments and Liturgical Textiles from the Permanent Collection," July 27–October 9, 1983

The Art Institute of Chicago, Elizabeth F. Cheney and Agnes Allerton Textile Galleries, "European Textile Masterpieces from Coptic Times through the 19th Century," September 27, 1989–January 22, 1990

The Art Institute of Chicago, Elizabeth F. Cheney and Agnes Allerton Textile Galleries, "Textile Masterpieces from the Art Institute of Chicago's Collection,"
February 17–May 2, 1993

The Art Institute of Chicago, Elizabeth F. Cheney and Agnes Allerton Textile Galleries, "Gloria in Excelsis Deo: Heralding a Vestment Collection," September 11, 1996–January 12, 1997

The Art Institute of Chicago, Department of European Decorative Arts, Alsdorf Gallery, September 30, 1998– February 10, 1999

The Art Institute of Chicago, Elizabeth F. Cheney and Agnes Allerton Textile Galleries, "Renaissance Velvets and Silks," December 18, 2002–April 13, 2003

Publication History

Margaret E. Tabor. The Saints in Art (London: Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1913), pp. 50-51, etc.

Christie's South Kensington. "Sale of Uniforms, Militaria, Fans, Textiles, Embroidery and Costume" (sales catalogue), Thursday, November 18, 1976, p. 12, no. 142.

Christa C. Mayer Thurman. "Some Major Textile Acquisitions from Europe and Egypt" Museum Studies, vol. 11, no. (Fall 1984). pp. 52-69.

Christa C. Mayer Thurman. Textiles in The Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago: The Art Institute of Chicago, 1992), p. 26-7 (illus.), 143.

The Art Institute of Chicago. “Devotion & Splendor: Medieval Art at the Art Institute of Chicago.” Museum Studies. vol. 30, no. 2 (Chicago: The Art Institute of Chicago, 2004).