My partner’s party trick of creating a trussed oven-ready chicken out of a folded napkin must pale into insignificance compared with the rather unique exhibition currently entertaining and amazing visitors to the Holburne Museum in Bath.
Artist Joan Sallas is the world’s leading authority on historic linen folding and a virtuoso folder himself! His display of elaborately folded napkins and linen, inspired by Renaissance and Baroque patterns, is currently showing until April the 28th.
Based on meticulous research into court etiquette he has almost singlehandedly revived the extraordinary art that first appeared in Renaissance Italy but reached its zenith in German-speaking lands in the 17th century.
Sallas has exhibited across Europe and America but never before in the UK. So this is a first for Bath and a chance for visitors to see examples of a remarkable and spectacular art form from a highly-skilled and passionate artist.
One of the big set pieces is the creation of a 1.5 m high table fountain flanked by heraldic beasts – the sort of elaborate display that would have graced the tables of courts and those of high society across Europe.
