The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1889-11-03
NEW THINGS In SCREENS.
wEIL-KNowN PEOPLES LIBRARY
AND PARLOR ORNAMENTS.

and Brocade-F1emish and Venetian
Patterns and Louie XVI Ideas The
House Beautiful and How It ia
Adorned.
NEW YoRK, Nov. 2-Studio receptions
and studio weddings have something to dc
with the high honor in which is held the
screen. Since artists like Louis Tiffany
and William NJ. Chase and J. Wells Champ
ney and LIE Grand Cannon have taken &c
throwing open their workshops, and fluffy
haired lasses have made their promises to
love and honor in the company of palettes
aud canvases we have learned to appre
ciate the decorative, the artistic and the
picturesque-the portiere, the easel and the
screen. Ask any young matron just set
Ting her lares and penates if you shall get
her bit of royal Worcester or a fine bronze.
and the chances are three In four that she
will tell you that she prefers a screen.
Question further what sort of a screen will
be welcome and the answer will depend
upon which she makes her pct room
1t was a screen for the hall which was
sent by Mrs. Henry Barclay, to bride who
was married in "gay little Orange" few
weeks ago. The brides father had given
her an artistically finished cottage, and the
screen was designed to cut off partially the
inglenook with its blazing fire and cusn-
toned seats from the broad staircase rising
to one side. The hall is paneled in dark
oak and the screen is of Illuminated leather
in four panels standing nearly seven feet
high. The designs are conventional and
are painted in browns, tans and bronze,
with touches of dull red to correspond with
the rugs and portieres, the effect being
very rich, though the cost would not COM
pare with that of the leather screen which
Mrs. Whitney has in the dining room Of
ner Fifty-seventh street mansion.
Mrs Whitney's screen is probably one of
the finest examples of its sort to be found
IN the country. Ii was made to order
from a piece of genuine old Illuminated
leather of past and gone century. Old
figure paintings of the same era showing
men and women in quaint costumes are set
in the leaves and the borders are relief
work quite elaborate in design.
1t is a favorite device of artists to take
old canvases which they have accumu-
lated in their wandering and set them, in
lieu Of hanging, in the panels of leather
screens Sometimes the paintings thus
utilized are comparatively valueless, and
sometimes they are Of unique interest,
as is the case with three historical compost
tions by Angelica Kaufman, which | saw
so framed at loan exhibition last summer in
the studio of Kate Perugini, who is daugh-
Ter of Charles Dickens and one of the prom
inent painters of London.
A library screen which is owned by q
rich though not studious New York
lady is of illuminated leather and the panels
are gilded with pure leaf gold. On this
background landscape is painted in soft
rich tones, and no framework is visible, the
exquisite leather work covering ALL
Screens of this sort, even without the gild-
ing, are very expensive if any merit at
taches to the painting, the one In question
bearing the signature of an artist of repute
and having cost $500.
Most leather screens are patterned after
Venetian or Flemish models. The Flemish
designs are in raised work and are exqui.
sitely finished in details, though the color
ing, always bright, sometimes approaches
the border line of the glaring Flemish
screens stand sometimes eight feet high
and good reproduction of the work of the
old leather masters costs from 5000 TO $500
Bona fide antiques come even higher. Such
screens are suitable only for large and i'm
posing rooms. Venetian screens are equally
rich and often more refined. The Venetian
work is i'll low relief in gold and silver and
the back ground is hand fooled Mrs.
w LIOIl recently
a screen OF this order. In design it was
modelled on a piece of old lace and every
thread was brought out with wonderful
fidelity in the cobwebby tracery of gold
and silver lines. Ii was q screen of three
leaves only, but such unique piece of work
could not be bought in open market for less
than $3.50.
In the library of Emily Faithfulls Plym-
outh Grove house, year ago. | saw
leather screen brought from the continent
by Miss Charlotte Robinson, who is her
home mate, and art decorator to the queen.
The design was in four leaves, each leaf
being made up of four square panels, each
panel being hedged about by frame of
gilded nails, and painted with dogs. hunts
men, or gorse-ccvered hills on O fooled
background. The colors were ricn. dark
and low toned. Embossed leather screens
for the dining room or dyed leather de-
signs are mucn less expensive, the colors
being pain ed or sometime stamped in
colors and bronze.
IL was in the last century that the screen
reached the zenith Of its popularity, and
the charming, the smilingly pretty, the
1rlvolously perfect Vatican and Boucher
designs are still the daintiest for parlor or
boudoir. These designs are the designs par
excellence for painted screens, and tapestry
the material to which they take most kind
ly. The Louis XVI. screen has rarely
more than three leaves. 1t Is of irregular
shape, the middle leaf towering above the
other two aud curving down to meet the
sloping tops of its mates on either side, It
Is always set in a heavy gilt frame Mrs.
u y. Mills, Jr.. owns very beautiful one
1t stands i'll her drawing room beside a
Louis XVI couch and cutting off the view
of the company from the two who
may be tete-a-tete in the corner. The panels
are of Aubusson tapestry, showing pow
dered and paniered ladies and bowling cava-
Tiers. The tapestry does not reach in either
panel to the top of the frame Above it is
set piece of thick plate glass through
which one can watch unseen the cominRs
and the goings of danes and damsels.
Mrs. George Gould has Louis XVI
screen for her boudoir. The top of It is
nearly straight and it has no glass panels.
The frame is unusually heavy for work of
that period and it has four rather small
panels. The tapestry is exquisite, showing
sunshiny designs of nymphs and shepherd
esses dancing on smooth-shaven green
sward
Modern tapestry screens are favorite
ornaments in drawing rooms, and are often
as interesting as fine paintings hung on the
wall. The designs indeed are not infre-
quently by artists famous over half the
world. Many of them come from Paris.
and people like Albert, like Houghton and
Nine. Chennebierre, who are known TO all
IAN collectors, are beginning to turn their
attention to screens. Tapestry painting is
not essentially difficult, especially to those
VINO understand water colors. and there are