En Tous Points Parfaits (In Every Way Perfect)

Sumptuous liturgical garments highlighted, embroidered by the most talented professionals from all over Europe for different monasteries of the Visitation.

For several years now, the Musée de la Visitation has been showing the public the genius and quality of needlework, gradually revealing the richness, diversity and beauty of its textile collections which contribute to its international reputation.

In every way perfect , is thus part of the continuity of Sacrée Soieries, which presented the most remarkable fabrics in 2012, and De Fleurs en aiguille, which in 2009 revealed the splendour of the embroidered decorations in the shade of the cloisters.

Through this exhibition, the Musée de la Visitation wants to present to the public the beauty of the work of professional embroiderers of the 19th and 20th centuries, works too often forgotten behind the clothes of the Ancien Régime in exhibitions and reasoned catalogues.

From dozens of Visitations of France and a few foreign monasteries, 150 works from this period have been selected to illustrate the genius and diversity of professional productions, painted with a needle with fine threads of silk, gold and gold. ‘silver. Liturgical vestments, banners and many more.

Visitors will be dazzled by the brilliance of the gold ornaments, charmed by the shimmering colors of the embroidered flowers, struck by the naturalness of the lambs’ fleece, admiring the sumptuous decorations filled with elegant foliage, arches and golden flowers.

Because if embroidery is very practiced in the convents of the order of the Visitation in the 17th and 18th centuries, this activity is in decline in the following centuries. Also, benefactors, the families of the nuns and sometimes the nuns themselves turn to chasubliers-embroiderers, these many specialized houses which offer an infinite number of models and adapt to specific orders.

The scenography allows visitors to get as close as possible to the works, thus discovering the specificity of the techniques and styles marking the different stages of the decorative arts of this period.

He will also have the chance to discover liturgical vestments in a perfect state of preservation despite their respectable age. The visitandines took care to keep them clean and dignified by protecting them from light and dust, which is unfortunately rarely the case in the main cathedral or abbey treasures open to the public.