Fame at the tomb of Shakespeare

Object Type
This embroidered picture was copied from a print published in 1782, which was based on a drawing by the Swiss portrait painter and decorative artist Angelica Kauffmann (1741-1807), who worked in London from the later 1760s to 1781. As the print was published in black and white, the embroiderer was free to choose her colours and stitches, and so demonstrate both her taste and skill. The picture may have been part of a decorative scheme (perhaps including other designs by Kauffmann) on walls, furniture or porcelain. Her designs had more widespread and diverse uses than those of any other decorative painter of the period.

Materials and Making
This style of embroidered picture was almost always worked in coloured silks on a white satin ground, with the design, taken from an engraving, sketched onto the background. The finer details of the figures, particularly the faces and hands, were painted directly onto the satin.

Subjects Depicted
The subject of the picture was intended both as tribute to Shakespeare's literary fame and as a fashionable expression of romantic sorrow. It was the first of various memorial subjects for embroideries in Britain, another popular one being the scene of Charlotte mourning over the grave of Werther, from the German poet Goethe's The Trials of Young Werther (first published in 1774). It may have been the original inspiration behind the memorial embroideries which became enormously popular in the USA, particularly after the death of George Washington in 1799.