Extra Large Antique Portuguese Needlework Area Rug

A decorative mid 20th century Portuguese needlework antique carpet, the soft camel field with an allover lattice formed of curving vinery and containing flowerheads and vinery within a scrolling vinery border. The ancient craft of needlepoint, also known a ‘canvas needle-work’, ‘canvas embroidery’ or ‘petit point’ ?ourished most notably in England and France. Executed rugs with wool yarn on jute, hemp, or linen canvas until the latter was replaced by cotton around 1825, needlepoints are easily identified by their distinctive stitches—the tent stitch or petit point, and gros point. English needlepoint rugs kits, renowned for their profuse ?oral motifs, reached an artistic zenith in 1700-1750 but were produced through the end of the nineteenth century. Mainly used as table large modern area rugs, the earliest pieces, dating from 1550-1650, exhibited scrolls of ?owers with pictorial and heraldic motifs. Eighteenth-century pieces reveal the in?uence of contemporary artistic movements including baroque, chinoiserie, neoclassical, and rococo.Chinese reproductions of French and English patterns and European rugs first crafted in the 1920s and revived again in the 1980s, often rival their rare antecedents in quality and authenticity of pattern and coloration. Moreover, new contemporary and transitional patterns have emerged, ensuring the longevity of the needlepoint art form.