Void Work at Philadelphia

Early in January I had the opportunity to visit the textile study room at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. I enjoyed a session of six beautiful pieces of void work embroidery. Over several posts I will talk about some of those pieces.  I have only begun to study my photos, and some thoughts may change as I study in more depth, and more importantly, as I try to work pieces in the same manner. 

One of the pieces, accession number 1894-30-111 is one of three that can be seen on the museum's website. The on-line notation, found at this link lists the piece as "14th or 15th Century," however, the Textile Department's internal cataloging information has updated that to 16th Century.

As with the other pieces of this type, the linen ground is embroidered with red silk threads. This piece features  more open ground stitching, a tightly pulled Two Sided Italian Cross stitch. Access to the back of the piece showed that the outline of the design -- also red, not a contrasting color -- has the reversibility commonly found with double running stitch. Stitches used within the void work, providing detail, appear to be straight stitches or back stitches. The linen is moderately roughly woven, and the thread is quite thick and covers the ground well.  The stitches are tightly pulled to create the open background. At 16 3/4 x 4 1/8 inches, enough of the piece exists to see one full repeat.

Here are a couple of my close photos of the piece:

Taken at a slight angle, this photo shows the thickness of the red silk threads

Where stitches add detail to the void design, they are not pulled.

Through a linen tester held above the piece.