Mise-en-carte (Point-paper)

Veret · 1760/90

Medium

Ink and gouache on hand drawn graph paper

Original size

28 × 45.5 cm (11 × 17 7/8 in.)

Currently held

Art Institute of Chicago

Movement

Rococo

Mise-en-carte (Point-paper) is at once a working document and a quietly beautiful object — a weaver's design chart rendered with the care of a finished artwork. In eighteenth-century Lyons, the centre of European silk production, designers produced these intricate grid-based drawings to guide weavers at the loom. Each square on the hand-drawn graph paper corresponds to a single thread intersection, translating an intended pattern into precise, actionable instructions. Veret worked in this tradition sometime between 1760 and 1790, using ink to lay down the structure and gouache — an opaque, water-based medium — to fill in the colours with a flatness and clarity that would read well under workshop conditions. What elevates this piece beyond pure utility is the evident skill in the draughtsmanship and the considered use of colour, reminding us that the designers of luxury silk were themselves accomplished artists. Point-paper designs from the Lyons silk trade are among the best-documented examples of applied art from this period, and the Art Institute of Chicago holds several that attest to the sophistication of the industry's visual culture. The hand-painted oil reproduction translates Veret's meticulous linework and layered colour onto canvas, preserving the precision and intimacy of the original at a scale that works beautifully as a piece of wall art.