See more objects with the color rosybrown grey or see all the colors for this object.

Object Timeline

1955

  • Work on this object began.

1975

  • Work on this object ended.

1993

  • We acquired this object.

2009

2012

2014

2024

  • You found it!

Hanging (USA)

This is a Hanging. It was designed by Trude Guermonprez. It is dated 1955–1975 and we acquired it in 1993. Its medium is silk, synthetic metallic yarns and its technique is two intercrossed plain weave structures (double cloth). It is a part of the Textiles department.

Trude Guermonprez was a much-admired weaver and professor of textile arts at California College of Art. She was trained at the School of Fine and Applied Arts in Halle, Germany, sometimes called the “little Bauhaus,” as many of its faculty had studied or taught there. After World War II, she made her way to California by way of Black Mountain College in North Carolina, where she taught alongside Anni Albers, and Pond Farm Workshop in Guerneville, California, where she joined another former Bauhausler, Marguerite Wildenhain.
Like Anni Albers, Guermonprez admired the aesthetic and structural integrity of double cloth, which has two independent, intersecting planes. In this piece, she used over-twisted yarns in one of the layers to create an interlocking grid of varied textures in off-white. The crepe effect also draws up the sparsely used black wefts into lines of abstracted calligraphic script, another deep interest which Guermonprez developed more fully in her later work.

This object was donated by Eric and Sylvia Elsesser. It is credited Gift of Mr. Eric and Mrs. Sylvia Elsesser, The Trude Guermonprez Archives.

  • Hanging (England)
  • linen, metal rods.
  • Museum purchase from Friends of Textiles Fund.
  • 1976-37-1

Our curators have highlighted 5 objects that are related to this one. Here are three of them, selected at random:

  • Textile, #2765 Yuragi (Fluctuation)
  • warp and weft of polyester monofilament, supplementary weft of washi....
  • Gift of The Museum of Modern Art, courtesy of the designer.
  • 2002-17-5
  • Hanging, First Snow
  • cotton warp, wool weft.
  • Gift of Mr. Eric and Mrs. Sylvia Elsesser, The Trude Guermonprez Archives.
  • 1993-121-1

Its dimensions are

H x W: 203.2 x 72.4 cm (80 x 28 1/2 in.)

It is inscribed

Label glued to side hem, "HANDWOVEN, TRUDE GUERMONPREZ."

Cite this object as

Hanging (USA); Designed by Trude Guermonprez (American, b. Germany, 1910–1976); silk, synthetic metallic yarns; H x W: 203.2 x 72.4 cm (80 x 28 1/2 in.); Gift of Mr. Eric and Mrs. Sylvia Elsesser, The Trude Guermonprez Archives; 1993-121-25

This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Making Design.

There are restrictions for re-using this image. For more information, visit the Smithsonian’s Terms of Use page.

For higher resolution or commercial use contact ArtResource.

If you would like to cite this object in a Wikipedia article please use the following template:

<ref name=CH>{{cite web |url=https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18643315/ |title=Hanging (USA) |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=23 April 2024 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>