#6642 $16,000
Fortuny stenciled velvet coat, early 1920s
"Faithfully antique but powerfully original..." Marcel Proust
Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo created some of the most remarkable textiles of the 20th century. In his brilliant multifarious output, Fortuny often drew inspiration from antique textiles. He did not simply copy the old designs; he reinterpreted them to achieve an aesthetic ideal. His fluid wraps of textured and patterned velvet hold a legendary place in 20th century fashion.
His famous atelier in the Palazzo Orfei overlooked the Grand Canal in Venice, once an important center of the Renaissance textile trade with the Orient. The Venetian artistic tradition was thus a rich source of ideas from ancient Persian and Islamic cultures.
The Palazzo Orfei was as much a legend in Fortuny's time as his work and original persona. Large salons were filled with his own art and that of his father, a famous painter; ancient statues presided over divans strewn with cushions in the Moorish way; draperies and panels of Fortuny's textiles hung from the ceilings.
The novelist Marcel Proust writes about a particular Fortuny velvet as being "of an intense blue, which as my gaze extended over it, was changed into a malleable gold, by those same transmutations which, before the advancing gondolas, change into flaming metal the azure of the Grand Canal."
Fortuny treated velvets with a special technique of multilayered dyeing, which sends the base color floating up mysteriously through the pile to catch the light in a different ways, depending on the angle of view.
The colors in this sublime three-quarter-length coat change from silver to bronze, reflecting the many layers of hand mixed pigment. The edges are bound with padded, stenciled blue velvet. The coat is lined with rose/peach satin.
Fortuny's virtuosity with textiles had most free rein with the loosely structured garments worn over the Delphos gown. These garments were often made of velvet, which he called "the aristocrat of stuffs," a term used by the Renaissance world that inspired him. His large collection of antique textiles included many Renaissance velvets, which he studied closely, reproducing even their aged patina.
This peerless velvet coat was originally meant to be worn over a Fortuny Delphos tea gown, but the jacket can be equally dramatic over pants and a sweater. The illustration below, from a 1923 issue of Vogue, shows a similar Fortuny coat.
Although known today primarily as a textile designer, Fortuny was also a painter, etcher, sculptor, photographer, lighting engineer, set designer, theatre director, inventor and architect. In the field of design, he personified the Renaissance man who could do it all.
In the graphic arts, Fortuny's love and obsession was color in all its intricate subtlety. He made himself an expert in the manufacture, mixing, and application to textiles of dyes, especially from natural sources.
There has never been a greater creator of color masterpieces in textile than Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo. As a young man, he stated, "Art is my life's aim." His work is a living testament to his fidelity to that ideal.
The condition is almost excellent. On one side is a small area of slight fading. It blends in with the busy pattern and does not detract from the appearance of the coat.
The size is adjustable, depending on how tightly the coat is belted. It measures: approximately 40" bust and waist, 54" hip, 25" sleeve length, and 44" from the shoulder to the hem.
