Woodcutters Working at a Deer Park (from the Hunting Parks Tapestries)

Art Historical Context

This monumental tapestry, *Woodcutters Working at a Deer Park*, was woven in the South Netherlands between about 1515 and 1535. Created from wool and silk threads, it belongs to a larger series known as the Hunting Parks Tapestries, which celebrated the managed woodlands and game reserves of the European nobility. At over eleven feet high, the work would once have covered an entire wall in a great hall, providing both insulation and splendid decoration. The scene shows men and women engaged in the practical labor of maintaining a deer park—felling trees, gathering wood, and tending the landscape—while deer move gracefully through the background. Such subjects blended everyday rural activity with aristocratic ideals of order and stewardship over nature. South Netherlandish weavers were renowned for their technical skill, using fine silk highlights to catch the light and create a rich, painterly surface that rivaled the costliest paintings of the day. Acquired by the Metropolitan Museum through the bequest of financier George Blumenthal in 1941, the tapestry offers modern viewers a vivid window into early-sixteenth-century attitudes toward land, labor, and leisure.