The Tirocchi Collection: Textiles

Textiles and Fashion

The Tirocchi Collection: Textiles

1915 - 1947

Overview -

The Tirocchi Collection at the University of Rhode Island consists of well over 1000 objects including dresses, unfinished “robes,” one-yard lengths of fabric, and fragments. These artifacts were acquired in 1990 after URI partnered with the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art to accession items from a defunct dressmakers’ shop in Providence, Rhode Island. Anna and Laura Tirocchi, immigrants from Rome, Italy, settled in Providence and opened their shop in the Federal Hill district in 1915. When Anna died in 1947, Laura closed the shop, and it remained untouched until 1989.

Tirocchi Collection Textiles - 

Included in the Tirocchi collection are examples that establish connections between modern art movements and textiles from the shop. Textiles had a similar design aesthetic as modern paintings, decorative art objects, illustration, sculpture and architecture. Deborah Siravo established criteria for assigning textiles to nineteenth- and twentieth-century art movements. These are Orientalism and Primitivism, Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, Rococo Revival, Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau, Art Deco, Fauvism, Cubism, Futurism, Constructivism, Dada and Surrealism, and Abstract Expressionism. 

Orientalism and Primitivism

Orientalism was a recurring theme in the fine and decorative arts by the end of the nineteenth century. The term refers to western infatuation with eastern art and culture. Primitivism references exotic cultures, specifically African, Oceanic, pre-Columbian, and Aboriginal, that inspired artists and collectors at the beginning of the twentieth century. 

Both Orientalism and Primitivism are outmoded as terms. Today it is preferable to assign a specific geographical of chronological association, such as Chinese rather than Oriental.

Impressionism and Post-Impressionism

Impressionism is acknowledged as first art movement to express modernism. Impressionist painters such as Claude Monet and Camille Pissaro concerned themselves with the ephemeral nature of light, color, shadow, and movement. Their subject matter often depicted the outdoors. Post-Impressionists continued Impressionist ideas, but developed unique styles that lead the way to increasingly abstract works of art.

Rococo Revival

In the second half of the nineteenth century, architects and designers looked to the past for inspiration. The eighteenth-century rococo period, with its delicate colors and classical motifs, was a favorite.  Swags, garlands of flowers, ribbons, pastel colors, and symmetrical arrangements are features of Rococo Revival textiles.

Arts and Crafts

William Morris and John Ruskin founded the Arts and Crafts movement in Britain in response to the mechanization of the Industrial Age. They revived traditional handcrafts such as embroidery and tapestry for textiles, although their design philosophy influenced architecture, furniture, wallpaper, and illustration. In the early twentieth century, the designs of the Scotsman Charles Rennie Mackintosh exhibited Arts and Crafts influence.

Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau was at its height from 1890 to 1910. Art Nouveau designs are characterized by serpentine lines that include stylized flowers, foliage, animals, and birds in repeating patterns. Its characteristics curvilinear motifs can be found in architecture, furniture, ceramics, glass, and textiles.

Art Deco

Art Deco is the popular term that evolved from the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris. In its earlier phase in the 1910s, motifs were derivative of Art Nouveau. After the mid 1920s, motifs became geometric and truly modern looking. 

Fauvism

Fauvism is associated with a small group of artists living in France during the period 1905 to 1907. “Fauves” means “wild beasts” in French. This short-lived movement embraced the use of unrestrained and arbitrary color combinations.  

Cubism

Cubism developed in France in the first decade of the twentieth century, and it became a major development in Western art. Its use of fragmented perspectives and collage arrangements introduced a new way of seeing. Abstracted patterns, simplified natural forms, and collaged patterns characterized Cubist-inspired textiles.

Futurism

Futurism was an Italian art movement generated by Marinetti’s 1909 Futurist Manifesto. Italian Futurists declared that machinery would change the landscape of society. Futurist influence on textiles is evident in the conception of motifs, which became more focused on architectural elements rather than pictorial designs. All-over patterns, circles, stripes, and repetitive movement are identifying criteria.

Constructivism

The Russian Constructivists (post 1917’s Bolshevik Revolution) believed that collaboration between art, technology, and industry could change society for the better. Russian textile designers created fabrics in brilliant colors and abstract patterns as well as thematic designs. The Constructivist textiles in the Tirocchi Collection reference mechanical-like repetitions of abstract lines.

Dadaism and Surrealism

Illusion, dream-like fantasy, irrational, subversive, irreverent, nihilistic, humorous, and often erotic are terms used to describe the Dada movement and its successor, Surrealism. Textiles influenced by Dadaism and Surrealism include warm colors, linear repeats, and abstract flat shapes.

Abstract Expressionism

Abstract Expressionism developed in New York following World War II. Sub genres include action painting, represented by Jackson Pollack’s works created by dripping and pouring paint onto canvases, and colorfield painting, exemplified by Mark Rothko’s color-block surfaces. The Tirocchi textile that best represents Abstract Expressionism features abstract geometric shapes in contrasting colors connected by thin black lines.

For more about the Tirocchi dressmaker’s shop, see the website “A. & L. Tirocchi Dressmakers Project” developed by the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art and stored on Brown University’s server.

http://tirocchi.stg.brown.edu

See also Susan Hay (ed.), From Paris to Providence: Fashion, Art, and the Tirocchi Dressmakers’ Shop, 1915-1947 (Providence: Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, 2000).

Two URI master’s theses utilized the Tirocchi collection:

Deborah M. Siravo. Reflections of Modernism: Textiles from the Tirocchi Dressmakers’ Shop, 1915-1947. Unpublished Master’s Thesis, University of Rhode Island, 2008.

Hilary Baker. The Use of “Robes” by American Dressmakers: A. & L. Tirocchi, Providence, Rhode Island. Unpublished master’s thesis, University of Rhode Island, 2014. Available through Digital Commons http://digitalcommons.uri.edu/theses/290

Donor: Louis J. Cella, Jr.

Deborah Siravo, MS '08