Coll.
A. and E. Offermann, Cologne (1965–2012). – Formerly private collection of
Reichskanzler Franz von Papen (1879–1969), from June–December 1932 last
but one Reichskanzler of the Weimar Republic, from January 1933 to July
1934 vice-chancellor in Hitler’s cabinet, later ambassador of the German
Reich in Vienna and Ankara. Acquitted at the Nuremberg Trials of 1946, but
one year later as one of the main culprits condemned to eight years in a
labour camp as part of the denazification of Germany. Purchased in 2004
from Roswitha Eberwein, Antike Kunst, Göttingen. Declaration of provenance
on back of frame: “Sammlung von Papen”.
Literature
For style, ornamental structure and iconography, cf. Effenberger
– 1976, 178, 216 f., 239, 270 f., pls. 119, 121, 125 (of later date, but with
the same composition); Cat. Vienna – 2005, 155 f., no. 92 with illus.
Important Woven Cloth with Lion Frieze and Ornamental Bands.
Two-colored tapestry weave in silhouette style, fine-threaded, dark grey and
beige. Rectangular length of cloth with centered vertical frieze of
rampant lions with arching tails inside adjoining octagonal frames on a light-colored ground, surrounded by a band of dense braiding with inside
hatching alternating with flowers. Schematic palmettes in the spaces in
between. Outer ornamental band of hanging rhombi. Lined up along the narrow
edge at the bottom are four light-colored, stocky human figures with bird’s
feet, some with their left arm raised, set against a dark ground with fringed
border below them. Fragment of a hanging