{
"data": {
"id": 123539,
"accession_number": "1944.133",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Month of May: Scene of May Day Festival, 1723\u20131774. Gobelins Manufactory (France, Paris, est. 1662), Michel Audran (French, 1701\u20131771). Tapestry weave: linen warp, wool and silk wefts; overall: 2841.9 x 454.3 cm (1118 7/8 x 178 7/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Elisabeth Severance Prentiss Collection, 1944.133",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Month of May: Scene of May Day Festival",
"creation_date": "1723\u20131774",
"creation_date_earliest": 1723,
"creation_date_latest": 1774,
"artists_tags": [
"male",
"gender unknown"
],
"culture": [
"France"
],
"technique": "tapestry weave: linen warp, wool and silk wefts",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Textiles",
"collection": "Textiles",
"type": "Tapestry",
"measurements": "Overall: 2841.9 x 454.3 cm (1118 7/8 x 178 7/8 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"overall": {
"height": 28.419,
"height_inch": 1118,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.875,
"width": 4.543,
"width_inch": 178,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.875
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 355381,
"title": "Exhibition of the Month: Chinese Furniture",
"description": "Exhibition of the Month: Chinese Furniture. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 29-December 30, 1946).",
"opening_date": "1946-10-29T05:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "Loan Exhibition of Tapestries. Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH ([October 5-December 1, 1918)",
"opening_date": "1918-10-05T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "1944-",
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"description": "Seated spectators and splendidly clothed ladies and gentlemen on horseback watch May Day festivities in this tapestry. In the middle distance, archers prepare to shoot at a bush and bird placed atop a maypole, while more spectators congregate in the receding landscape. A border of rolled acanthus leaves and flower garlands frames the scene. This scene is one of twelve so-called Months of Lucas tapestries, each depicting activities that coincide with a month of the year.
The original \u201cMonths of Lucas\u201d was a sixteenth-century Flemish tapestry set that was owned by the French monarchy and mistakenly attributed to Lucas van Leyden during the 1600s. To this day, they continue to be known as the \u201cMonths of Lucas.\u201d This original set was burned in 1797 so their gold and silver metal threads could be used to replenish the depleted French coffers.
Beginning in the 1600s, the popular Months of Lucas were reproduced in several different versions under various masters at the Gobelins Manufactory in Paris, the famous royal production center for French tapestries since Louis XIV (1638\u20131715). The lower right hand corner of this tapestry bears the signature of Michel Audran (1701\u20131771), director of the Gobelins high-warp loom workshop from 1732\u201371, who produced this tapestry for a private patron in addition to the other royal commissions of the set.",
"external_resources": {
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"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1944.133-month-of-may-scene-o"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Fenaille, Maurice, Fernand Calmettes, and Jules Guiffrey. E\u0301tat ge\u0301ne\u0301ral des tapisseries de la Manufacture des Gobelins depuis son origine jusqu'a jours, 1600-1900. Paris: Imprimerie nationale, Hachette, 1903.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "https://books.google.fr/books?id=7bNFAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=fr&source=gbs_ge_summary_r#v=onepage&q&f=false"
},
{
"citation": "Ffoulke, Charles Mather, Sarah Cushing Ffoulke, Glenn Brown, and Ernest Verlant. The Ffoulke Collection of Tapestries. New York: Priv. Print, 1913.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "https://archive.org/details/ffoulkecollectio00ffou/page/344"
},
{
"citation": "Hunter, George Leland. \"The Loan Exhibition of Tapestries.\" The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 5, no. 8/9 (1918): 63-87. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25136215",
"page_number": "65",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25136215"
},
{
"citation": "Hunter, George Leland. \u201cThe Loan Exhibition of Tapestries.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art. (October-November, 1918), 63-66",
"page_number": "63-66",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Hunter, George Leland. Loan Exhibition of Tapestries. Cleveland Museum of Art. October 5th-December 1st 1918.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "https://archive.org/details/Tapestries_198617/page/n4"
},
{
"citation": "Hunter, George Leland. \u201cThe Cleveland Tapestry Exhibition\u201d in The Art World & Arts & Decoration (November 1918) 25-28.",
"page_number": "25-28",
"url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=KH0XAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA27&lpg=PA27&dq=the+four+seasons+tapestries+lucas&source=bl&ots=QWu0DyxXAj&sig=ACfU3U3Iq8ujNfIEMy8gtfrGGmlfNFP6mw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjwls3e6fPfAhVo2oMKHUd9CgIQ6AEwDHoECAMQAQ#v=onepage&q=the%20four%20seasons%20tapestries%20lucas&f=false"
},
{
"citation": "Hunter, George Leland. The Practical Book of Tapestries. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott company, 1925.",
"page_number": "120",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Heinrich, G\u00f6bel,[Editor]. Wandteppiche (II. Teil, Band 1): Die romanischen L\u00e4nder: Die Wandteppiche und ihre Manufakturen in Frankreich, Italien, Spanien und Portugal [Tapestries (Part II, Volume 1): The Romanesque countries: Tapestries and their factories in France, Italy, Spain and Portugal]. Leipzig: Klinkhardt & Biermann, 1928.",
"page_number": "143-45",
"url": "https://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/goebel1928bd2_1/0163/text_ocr"
},
{
"citation": "Underhill, Gertrude. \u201cTapestries and Embroideries,\u201d in Catalogue of the Elisabeth Severance Prentiss Collection. Cleveland Museum of Art, 1944.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Catalogue of the Elisabeth Severance Prentiss collection : bequest of Elisabeth Severance Prentiss, 1944. [Cleveland]: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1944. Published as: Tapestry: Month of May",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 66; Reproduced: XXIII",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/Prentiss/page/n55"
},
{
"citation": "Underhill, Gertrude. \u201cTapestries,\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art (June 1944), 102-103.",
"page_number": "102",
"url": "https://www.jstor.org/stable/25141134"
},
{
"citation": "Ward, Evelyn Svec. \"Four Seasons Tapestries from Gobelins.\" The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 40, no. 6 (1953): 113-19.",
"page_number": "113-119",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Standen, Edith A. \"Drawings for the \"Months of Lucas\" Tapestry Series.\" Master Drawings 9, no. 1 (1971): 3-80.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/1553120"
},
{
"citation": "Standen, Edith Appleton. European Post-Medieval Tapestries and Related Hangings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: The Museum, 1985.",
"page_number": "344",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wojciechowski, Jerzy. \"\"May\" and \"August\": Two Drawings by the Master of the Months of Lucas.\" Master Drawings 33, no. 4 (1995): 410-13.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/1554242"
},
{
"citation": "Standen, Edith Appleton and Janet Arnold. \"The Comte de Toulouse's 'Months of Lucas' Gobelins Tapestries: Sixteenth-Century Designs with Eighteenth-Century Additions,\" Metropolitan Museum Journal. (1996), 59-79.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/1512972"
},
{
"citation": "Mironneau, Paul. Muse\u0301e national du Cha\u0302teau de Pau. Paris: Re\u0301union des muse\u0301es nationaux, 2003.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Vittet, Jean, and Marc Walter. Les Gobelins au sie\u0300cle des Lumie\u0300res: un a\u0302ge d'or de la manufacture royale. 2014.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Hunter, George Leland. \"The Cleveland Tapestry Exhibition.\" The American Magazine of Art 10, no. 4 (1919): 129-37.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/23925160"
},
{
"citation": "Crick-Kuntziger, Marthe, \u201cL\u2019\u00e9nigme des \u2018Mois de Lucas,\u2019\u201d Actes du XIIe Congr\u00e8s international d\u2019Histoire de l\u2019Art. Volume 2. Brussels, 1930. 497-505.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
}
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"creditline": "The Elisabeth Severance Prentiss Collection",
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"biography": "For more information: http://www.oxfordartonline.com/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054-e-7000032919",
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"updated_at": "2026-08-22 11:53:13.128000"
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}