	The Norbury Tapestries
	The Commissioning of the Tapestries The extension of the Norbury Church vestries, in 1985, seems to have provided the original inspiration for the Tapestries, in that it created two blank walls. It was recognised that these were areas which would be improved by decoration and that they were spaces where liturgical art with a didactic purpose could be effectively displayed. The first part of the scheme was made possible by a donation from Gerald Benson, President of the Benatty Oil Corporation, Ohio, USA, towards a memorial in the form of a textile, in commemoration of his parents, Joseph and Florence Benson, former Norbury parishoners. Designs were submitted. After nine months of negotiation those of Meira Stockl were accepted and the Tapestry of the Cross was commissioned in 1987 by Canon Cyril Barton, then Vicar of Norbury. It was dedicated at a service on 13 December of that year. The original plan for a second Tapestry could not be carried out until financial provision was made. Canon Barton made applications for grants, eventually receiving a contribution from the charity, Art in Churches, which covered a sixth of the price. It was, however, another generous donation which made it possible to commission the second tapestry three years after the first. This gift was given by Walter Booth, a retired baker of Macclesfield and regular communicant at Norbury, in memory of his parents, Joseph and Eliza Anne Booth, of the former Bramhall House Farm (the site of which is now occupied by Mirrlees factory). The Booths are an old Norbury family: Joseph was born in the parish and went to Norbury School. His brother (also Walter) was for many years a sidesman and churchwarden. The Tapestry of the Resurrection was commissioned from the same artist and was dedicated on 1st December 1991. Alterations and additions to church furnishings cannot be made without a lengthy procedure. After discussion and agreement by the minister and the Parochial Church Council (an elected body of parishioners), the incumbent must petition for a Faculty from the Diocese. This may involve detailed questioning to establish the suitability of the proposal and gives opportunity for possible objections to be raised. Through this procedure, the plans for the Tapestries, and also the design and wording of the memorial plaques, were subjected to intense scrutiny before they were permitted by the Chancellor of the Diocese of Chester. A Brief History of Tapestry The word 'tapestry' comes from the French tapisserie. The term is often misapplied to embroidery worked with a needle on a woven textile, these days usually in tent stitch on a canvas background. (This work is also sometimes called 'needle-point'.) Technically, however, a tapestry is an ornamental textile woven on a loom, its pattern produced by passing different coloured weft threads through fixed warp threads. Thus, the pattern in a true tapestry is created during the weaving process, not added later. (The famous Bayeux 'Tapestry' is not a true tapestry but an embroidery.) Tapestry can be woven on a vertical ('high-beam') loom or a horizontal ('low-beam') loom with treadles; both methods produce the same effect. Tapestry weaving is an ancient craft. There is evidence (from Egyptian art) for the existence of looms as long ago as 3000 BC. The technique was probably transmitted to Western Europe through the Coptic Christian culture in Egypt which developed between the third and seventh centuries. In medieval Europe, tapestry production increased to provide cover for the vast, bare walls of the castles in which great kings and dukes lived, which, for reasons of security, had few windows and doors. Often depicting historical or legendary narratives, woollen tapestries added decoration and warmth, and, as furnishings, had the advantage that they could be easily packed up and transported for their aristocratic owners who were frequently on the move. Tapestries were also used in churches, but since there was less wall space available there, they were less popular than in secular buildings. However, tapestries depicting religious subjects were hung in the side aisles, suspended from pillars and at the fronts of altars, or used as warm stall-covers in winter. In medieval times, both French and Flemish weavers were renowned. Many were peripatetic, moving to weave for the next patron who required them; but gradually weaving centres became established, such as Arras, capital of Artois (now in northern France) and Tournai (now in Belgium). The popularity of tapestries continued to grow during and after the Renaissance. The most productive period was the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when flamboyant monarchs such as the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (1500-1558) and Louis XIV of France (1638-1715) sought to impress the world with their magnificence. It was during this era that the great 'Manufactories' at Aubusson, Beauvais and the Gobelins, in Paris, were established, and France came to dominate tapestry making. Tapestries could be of enormous size, and were often made in sets on a common theme. The late-fourteenth-century Apocalypse, now in the Loire chateau of Angers, consisted of seven hangings, each about eighty by twenty feet. The Nine Heroes were a popular subject, reproduced repeatedly for about a century and a half in sets of three hangings. In time, even biblical subjects came to be treated in a secular manner. There was less reliance on the traditional themes of the scriptures and classical mythology, as patrons ordered tapestries on the history of their own countries, sometimes on their own triumphs. The Story of the King, a set of twenty tapestries about nineteen feet by twelve, was reproduced eighty three times and distributed all over Europe to testify to the greatness of its subject - Louis XIV. Even as recently as the early 1800's, the Gobelins was producing sets of tapestries on the glorious reign of the current Emperor, Napoleon.	With the Renaissance, and its emphasis on the art of painting, it had become popular to copy paintings in tapestry. To this end, more and more colour tones were developed for use on the loom; by the late-eighteenth century there were well over 500 shades available, a number which increased to over 14,000 with the use of new chemical agents in the nineteenth century. (Many have failed to withstand exposure to light and the passage of time and have now faded to grey). In order to render the details of paintings minutely, tapestries became finer and tapestry-making more labour-intensive. In this slavish imitation of paintings, the weaver became merely a skilled copyist, and lost the freedom to interpret the design which had been enjoyed by medieval weavers. By the end of the eighteenth century, the popularity of woven hangings was declining. There was little demand for great murals, and tapestry degenerated from an art form into a soft-furnishing fabric. The second half of the twentieth century has brought a revival of interest in the art of tapestry, France, once again, has been in the forefront, but the movement is international. Twentieth-century tapestry is in some ways innovative, for example in its use of abstract art, but in other ways marks a return to features of medieval work. The great concrete expanses of modem architecture have once more provided spaces to be softened by textile hangings, and tapestry has returned to walls. The architect Le Corbusier expressed particular sympathy to tapestries and himself produced designs for them. Although some weavers have reproduced the works of modern painters such as Picasso and Braque, there has been a tendency to break away from the copying of paintings, and artists such as Lurçat have produced a great number of cartoons designed specifically to be woven. There has been a corresponding decrease in the number of colours and in the fineness of the weaving. Many designers do not weave their own works and are dependent on professional craftsmen for the final effect: the controversial Christ in Glory by Graham Sutherland, completed in 1962 for the new Coventry Cathedral, was woven at Aubusson. Over thirty eight feet wide and more than seventy eight feet high, it was the largest tapestry ever to have been made, and was woven by twelve weavers sitting side by side. The Designer / Weaver The Norbury Tapestries were designed and woven by Meira Stockl, whose cosmopolitan background and training in fine art contribute to her rich and startling textiles. She was born in the east end of London, in 1931, the daughter of an Indian (Hindu) father and Russian (Jewish) mother. She studied Fine Art at Hornsey College of Art, and undertook postgraduate research into Art Education at Oxford University. She later completed a diploma in Textile Art at Goldsmith College of Art. Originally a professional artist and teacher, her creative work included figurative and abstract subjects in oil and gouache as well as many drawings. She was Senior Lecturer in the Postgraduate Department of Art Education at Cardiff College of Art, then Principal Lecturer in charge of Art and Design at Ilkley College, where she became interested in decorative textiles. In 1984 she left full-time teaching to concentrate on weaving, specialising in tapestry and silk weaving. She undertakes private and public commissions and frequently exhibits. Norbury was her first church commission. As well as working as a creative artist, Meira Stockl is much in demand as a lecturer on Design, on Indian textiles and on her own work. She leads at least one Textiles Study Tour in India every year and runs many workshops in tapestry weaving. She is married to Eric Stockl, an Austrian-born potter. and they live in the Yorkshire Dales. Some Technical Details The Norbury Tapestries were woven on a vertical loom. For this technique the weaver sits in front of the loom, and works from the bottom, upwards. A small-scale version of the design (the 'cartoon') is attached close by for constant reference, and the basic shapes of the design are marked out in ink on the white threads of the warp before weaving commences. Weaving is carried out entirely by hand. There is no shuttle, though the weaver may wind lengths of wool round slender bobbins which can be passed between the warp threads. The weaving technique is a simple over-one-under-one. The Norbury Tapestries also have soumak ('wrapped weave') worked at the sides to create a raised edging and to give the three-dimensional effect of the fishing net in the Tapestry of the Resurrection. Both tapestries are six feet square, with a thread count of seven warps per inch, which is a coarse weave. The warp is cotton, the weft mostly wool (2-ply rug yarn) with some linen threads plied in to give textural variety and strength. The fibres were commercially spun and dyed, but intermixed by the artist to increase the range of shades. Meira Stockl works with a very large range of colours: there are perhaps a thousand different shades on the shelves of her studio, which she blends to create the exact lone required, sometimes creating gradual colour changes, at others choosing a more stark effect. The fact that the designer is also the weaver means that the design continues to develop while the tapestry is on the loom. Each tapestry took approximately three weeks to design and very much longer to weave: the first was on the loom for about five months and the second about seven. The weaver received £1000, the amount of the original donation, for the Tapestry of the Cross in 1988, and £3000 for the Tapestry of the Resurrection in 1991. These sums are large, but even so, they are not a commercial reflection of the number of hours of skilled craftsmanship and creative vision involved in making the hangings. The Norbury Tapestries are unique works of art, and as such, they are priceless. Gail Owen-Crocker
	Norbury Parish Church, Hazel Grove, Stockport, Cheshire. Telephone: 0161-483 6325

The Norbury Tapestries

The Commissioning of the Tapestries

The extension of the Norbury Church vestries, in 1985, seems to have provided the original inspiration for the Tapestries, in that it created two blank walls. It was recognised that these were areas which would be improved by decoration and that they were spaces where liturgical art with a didactic purpose could be effectively displayed.

The first part of the scheme was made possible by a donation from Gerald Benson, President of the Benatty Oil Corporation, Ohio, USA, towards a memorial in the form of a textile, in commemoration of his parents, Joseph and Florence Benson, former Norbury parishoners. Designs were submitted. After nine months of negotiation those of Meira Stockl were accepted and the Tapestry of the Cross was commissioned in 1987 by Canon Cyril Barton, then Vicar of Norbury. It was dedicated at a service on 13 December of that year.

The original plan for a second Tapestry could not be carried out until financial provision was made. Canon Barton made applications for grants, eventually receiving a contribution from the charity, Art in Churches, which covered a sixth of the price.

It was, however, another generous donation which made it possible to commission the second tapestry three years after the first. This gift was given by Walter Booth, a retired baker of Macclesfield and regular communicant at Norbury, in memory of his parents, Joseph and Eliza Anne Booth, of the former Bramhall House Farm (the site of which is now occupied by Mirrlees factory). The Booths are an old Norbury family: Joseph was born in the parish and went to Norbury School. His brother (also Walter) was for many years a sidesman and churchwarden.

The Tapestry of the Resurrection was commissioned from the same artist and was dedicated on 1st December 1991.

Alterations and additions to church furnishings cannot be made without a lengthy procedure. After discussion and agreement by the minister and the Parochial Church Council (an elected body of parishioners), the incumbent must petition for a Faculty from the Diocese. This may involve detailed questioning to establish the suitability of the proposal and gives opportunity for possible objections to be raised. Through this procedure, the plans for the Tapestries, and also the design and wording of the memorial plaques, were subjected to intense scrutiny before they were permitted by the Chancellor of the Diocese of Chester.

A Brief History of Tapestry

The word 'tapestry' comes from the French tapisserie. The term is often misapplied to embroidery worked with a needle on a woven textile, these days usually in tent stitch on a canvas background. (This work is also sometimes called 'needle-point'.) Technically, however, a tapestry is an ornamental textile woven on a loom, its pattern produced by passing different coloured weft threads through fixed warp threads. Thus, the pattern in a true tapestry is created during the weaving process, not added later. (The famous Bayeux 'Tapestry' is not a true tapestry but an embroidery.) Tapestry can be woven on a vertical ('high-beam') loom or a horizontal ('low-beam') loom with treadles; both methods produce the same effect.

Tapestry weaving is an ancient craft. There is evidence (from Egyptian art) for the existence of looms as long ago as 3000 BC. The technique was probably transmitted to Western Europe through the Coptic Christian culture in Egypt which developed between the third and seventh centuries.

In medieval Europe, tapestry production increased to provide cover for the vast, bare walls of the castles in which great kings and dukes lived, which, for reasons of security, had few windows and doors. Often depicting historical or legendary narratives, woollen tapestries added decoration and warmth, and, as furnishings, had the advantage that they could be easily packed up and transported for their aristocratic owners who were frequently on the move.

Tapestries were also used in churches, but since there was less wall space available there, they were less popular than in secular buildings. However, tapestries depicting religious subjects were hung in the side aisles, suspended from pillars and at the fronts of altars, or used as warm stall-covers in winter.

In medieval times, both French and Flemish weavers were renowned. Many were peripatetic, moving to weave for the next patron who required them; but gradually weaving centres became established, such as Arras, capital of Artois (now in northern France) and Tournai (now in Belgium).

The popularity of tapestries continued to grow during and after the Renaissance. The most productive period was the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when flamboyant monarchs such as the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (1500-1558) and Louis XIV of France (1638-1715) sought to impress the world with their magnificence. It was during this era that the great 'Manufactories' at Aubusson, Beauvais and the Gobelins, in Paris, were established, and France came to dominate tapestry making.

Tapestries could be of enormous size, and were often made in sets on a common theme. The late-fourteenth-century Apocalypse, now in the Loire chateau of Angers, consisted of seven hangings, each about eighty by twenty feet. The Nine Heroes were a popular subject, reproduced repeatedly for about a century and a half in sets of three hangings. In time, even biblical subjects came to be treated in a secular manner. There was less reliance on the traditional themes of the scriptures and classical mythology, as patrons ordered tapestries on the history of their own countries, sometimes on their own triumphs. The Story of the King, a set of twenty tapestries about nineteen feet by twelve, was reproduced eighty three times and distributed all over Europe to testify to the greatness of its subject - Louis XIV. Even as recently as the early 1800's, the Gobelins was producing sets of tapestries on the glorious reign of the current Emperor, Napoleon.

With the Renaissance, and its emphasis on the art of painting, it had become popular to copy paintings in tapestry. To this end, more and more colour tones were developed for use on the loom; by the late-eighteenth century there were well over 500 shades available, a number which increased to over 14,000 with the use of new chemical agents in the nineteenth century. (Many have failed to withstand exposure to light and the passage of time and have now faded to grey). In order to render the details of paintings minutely, tapestries became finer and tapestry-making more labour-intensive. In this slavish imitation of paintings, the weaver became merely a skilled copyist, and lost the freedom to interpret the design which had been enjoyed by medieval weavers.

By the end of the eighteenth century, the popularity of woven hangings was declining. There was little demand for great murals, and tapestry degenerated from an art form into a soft-furnishing fabric.

The second half of the twentieth century has brought a revival of interest in the art of tapestry, France, once again, has been in the forefront, but the movement is international. Twentieth-century tapestry is in some ways innovative, for example in its use of abstract art, but in other ways marks a return to features of medieval work. The great concrete expanses of modem architecture have once more provided spaces to be softened by textile hangings, and tapestry has returned to walls. The architect Le Corbusier expressed particular sympathy to tapestries and himself produced designs for them.

Although some weavers have reproduced the works of modern painters such as Picasso and Braque, there has been a tendency to break away from the copying of paintings, and artists such as Lurçat have produced a great number of cartoons designed specifically to be woven. There has been a corresponding decrease in the number of colours and in the fineness of the weaving.

Many designers do not weave their own works and are dependent on professional craftsmen for the final effect: the controversial Christ in Glory by Graham Sutherland, completed in 1962 for the new Coventry Cathedral, was woven at Aubusson. Over thirty eight feet wide and more than seventy eight feet high, it was the largest tapestry ever to have been made, and was woven by twelve weavers sitting side by side.

The Designer / Weaver

The Norbury Tapestries were designed and woven by Meira Stockl, whose cosmopolitan background and training in fine art contribute to her rich and startling textiles.

She was born in the east end of London, in 1931, the daughter of an Indian (Hindu) father and Russian (Jewish) mother. She studied Fine Art at Hornsey College of Art, and undertook postgraduate research into Art Education at Oxford University. She later completed a diploma in Textile Art at Goldsmith College of Art. Originally a professional artist and teacher, her creative work included figurative and abstract subjects in oil and gouache as well as many drawings. She was Senior Lecturer in the Postgraduate Department of Art Education at Cardiff College of Art, then Principal Lecturer in charge of Art and Design at Ilkley College, where she became interested in decorative textiles.

In 1984 she left full-time teaching to concentrate on weaving, specialising in tapestry and silk weaving. She undertakes private and public commissions and frequently exhibits. Norbury was her first church commission. As well as working as a creative artist, Meira Stockl is much in demand as a lecturer on Design, on Indian textiles and on her own work. She leads at least one Textiles Study Tour in India every year and runs many workshops in tapestry weaving. She is married to Eric Stockl, an Austrian-born potter. and they live in the Yorkshire Dales.

Some Technical Details

The Norbury Tapestries were woven on a vertical loom. For this technique the weaver sits in front of the loom, and works from the bottom, upwards. A small-scale version of the design (the 'cartoon') is attached close by for constant reference, and the basic shapes of the design are marked out in ink on the white threads of the warp before weaving commences.

Weaving is carried out entirely by hand. There is no shuttle, though the weaver may wind lengths of wool round slender bobbins which can be passed between the warp threads. The weaving technique is a simple over-one-under-one. The Norbury Tapestries also have soumak ('wrapped weave') worked at the sides to create a raised edging and to give the three-dimensional effect of the fishing net in the Tapestry of the Resurrection.

Both tapestries are six feet square, with a thread count of seven warps per inch, which is a coarse weave. The warp is cotton, the weft mostly wool (2-ply rug yarn) with some linen threads plied in to give textural variety and strength. The fibres were commercially spun and dyed, but intermixed by the artist to increase the range of shades.

Meira Stockl works with a very large range of colours: there are perhaps a thousand different shades on the shelves of her studio, which she blends to create the exact lone required, sometimes creating gradual colour changes, at others choosing a more stark effect. The fact that the designer is also the weaver means that the design continues to develop while the tapestry is on the loom. Each tapestry took approximately three weeks to design and very much longer to weave: the first was on the loom for about five months and the second about seven.

The weaver received £1000, the amount of the original donation, for the Tapestry of the Cross in 1988, and £3000 for the Tapestry of the Resurrection in 1991. These sums are large, but even so, they are not a commercial reflection of the number of hours of skilled craftsmanship and creative vision involved in making the hangings. The Norbury Tapestries are unique works of art, and as such, they are priceless.

Gail Owen-Crocker

The Norbury Tapestries

The Commissioning of the Tapestries

A Brief History of Tapestry

The Designer / Weaver

Some Technical Details

Norbury Parish Church, Hazel Grove, Stockport, Cheshire. Telephone: 0161-483 6325