Groteskentapijt met Hercules

Tapestry with Hercules and grotesques. Wool, silk. Designed by Perino del Vaga (1500 - 1547), by Josse van Herselle. Brussels, 1530 - 1540. Amid the columns stands the classical hero Hercules clad in a lionskin and holding a club in his hand. He is surrounded by an imaginative array of decorative motifs. Monkeys, satyrs, peacocks on a vase, men with masks and women with trumpets are piled up in vertical bands. These ornaments, which are known as grotesques, are characteristic of Renaissance decorative art. The tapestry is one of a set with gods among grotesques, which adorned the walls of Admiral Andrea Doria's Palazzo Bianco in Genoa.