Selected textile talks and exhibitions

Some OATG members have certainly had a busy summer! Speakers in this video of an event hosted by the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, include our founder Ruth Barnes (now at Yale University Art Gallery) and Sandra Sardjono of Tracing Patterns Foundation. They talk about textiles from Indonesia and the Philippines, but the themes they cover are relevant to many more areas.

“Colonialism, changing customs, war, and contemporary collecting practices have all impacted the use and meaning of textiles in Southeast Asia. In this online Re-History Series discussion, a panel of experts explores themes of loss, destruction, and conservation during colonial periods as well as the present day. They will discuss efforts to center the makers’ voices and recover from losses through research, conservation, and collaboration.” – Museum website

Sandra, along with her husband Chris Buckley, has been working on some exciting projects within the Tracing Patterns Foundation and I hope to share more on that work in the near future.

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Our Membership Secretary, David Richardson, is another OATG member who has been busy researching and writing – this time for an article which has just been published in Textiles Asia. The beautifully illustrated article discusses a collection of heirloom textiles from the Indonesian island of Solor, thus linking nicely to one of the subjects talked about by Ruth Barnes in the video above.

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A new exhibition opened last week at the Deutsches Textilmuseum (DTM) in Krefeld. Peru – ein Katzensprung (stone’s throw) celebrates the museum’s important collection of pre-Columbian textiles and runs until 23 April 2023. This is the first major exhibition of Peruvian textiles at the museum since 1959. An impressive 292 textiles are on display – the vast majority of which are from the DTM collection.

In the past pre-Columbian textiles were not bought for the collection from a cultural-historical point of view, but instead because of their motifs and the variety of techniques used. This is discussed in an interesting illustrated paper by Katalin Nagy for the Pre-Columbian Textiles Conference held in 2019. Click here to read The pre-Columbian textile collection of the German Textile Museum Krefeld.

Shirt, uncu, from the Huari Culture (8 – 10 century AD). Dyed camelid hair weft on cotton warp, tapestry weave. © Deutsches Textilmuseum

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This Thursday, 1 September, sees the opening of an exhibition at the California Museum, Sacramento, entitled Between 2 Worlds: Untold Stories of Refugees From Laos. This is a travelling exhibition that was developed by the Center for Lao Studies.

It ” presents crucial stages of the Lao refugee experience, inviting visitors to contemplate ideas of ‘home’ as seen through the eyes of people for whom the notion is precarious, and for those who have lived or are still living between two worlds.” – Museum website

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On Saturday, 3 September 2022, the World Textile Day team will be in Llanidloes, Wales. As usual there will be an eclectic mix of textiles on sale from an interesting group of dealers. This is in addition to the regular programme of talks. Entry to the event is free, with a small charge being made for the optional talks.

Full details can be found here.

Photo from a previous WTD Wales event.

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I seem to be reading more and more about textiles from the Philippines at the moment. This online event hosted by the Ayala Museum in Manila caught my attention. Intertwined Conversations: Transoceanic Journey of Luxury Goods is a conversation between Elena Phipps and Sandra Castro, moderated by Florina Capistrano-Baker. Elena will discuss how luxury goods such as silk, piña and chintz arrived in the Americas via the Manila Galleon trade and the impact these textiles had. Sandra will look at how traditional Philippine materials were used to make souvenirs in the form of Western material culture.

The timing of this event doesn’t work for our UK members (unless you are a real night owl and want to watch it at 2am), but hopefully does for some of our international members – 9 September at 21:00 EST, 18:00 PST, which is 10 September 09:00 in Manila.

For more details and registration click here.

By coincidence the new edition of Arts of Asia focuses on the Philippines, with articles including The Philippine Dress: 500 years of Straddling Polarities and Unfolding a Collection of Indigenous Philippine Textiles.

Cover of Arts of Asia

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The Textile Museum Associates of Southern California hold their next programme in early September. The subject of the webinar is Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk, and the speaker is Anna Jackson, Keeper of Asian Art at the V&A in London.

“The kimono is an iconic garment. A symbol of Japanese national culture and sensibility, it is generally perceived as a traditional, timeless costume. This talk counters that conception, revealing that the kimono has always been a highly dynamic, fashionable garment. It will explore the social and sartorial significance of the kimono in historical and contemporary contexts both in Japan and in the rest of the world, where its impact on dress styles has been felt since the seventeenth century.” TMA/SC

There will be two Zoom sessions, to accommodate participants from different time zones. The talk will be the same in each case, so please only sign up for one! The first is intended for the Western Hemisphere to India and takes place on Saturday 10 September at 10:00 PDT, 13:00 EDT, 18:00 BST. The registration link can be found here.

The talk will be held again on Sunday 11 September and this is intended for those in the East – 09:00 BST, 15:00 Bangkok, 17:00 Tokyo and 18:00 Sydney. The registration link to this talk can be found here.

Left: Outer kimono for a courtesan (uchikake), 1860- 70 (©Victoria and Albert Museum) 
Right: Kimono ensemble by Hiroko Takahashi, 2009 (©Hiroko Takahashi)

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Upcoming textile events – Peru, Mexico, China, the Silk Road and more….

There are two videos embedded in this blog. Subscribers who receive this via email will need to click on the blue title to go to our WordPress site and read the blog there to be able to view them.

I really enjoyed an online talk about the Peru exhibition at the British Museum by curators Jago Cooper and Cecilia Pardo-Grau. I’ve been informed by longstanding OATG member Pamela Cross that there are some fantastic textiles in this exhibition.

I was amazed to see this feather headdress from the Chimú-Inca culture, and enjoyed learning more about the process of preparing it for display.

Curator’s Choice: Feather Embellishments in Mexican Huipiles

I recently blogged about a talk by Elena Phipps as part of the Curator’s Choice series at the Fowler Museum. This particular talk was about Feather Embellishments in Mexican Huipiles and it is now available on Youtube for those who missed it.

Phoenix – a traditional festival badge by Margaret Lee

The Asian Arts Society of Australia (TAASA) has an interesting online event this week.

“Every culture in the world has some form of embroidery in their history but nowhere else has it played such a visible and significant role than in Chinese culture. With a history tracing back to the Neolithic period, embroidery has a continuous position that permeates every echelon and aspect of Chinese society, adapting with the times and, in the process, has itself developed from the fundamental purpose of decoration to fine art status. In this presentation [embroidery specialist] Margaret Lee shares with us key milestones of embroidery’s journey and its central place in Chinese history and culture.” – TAASA website.

This free event takes place on Tuesday 30 November at 18:30, which is 04:30 in the UK, so it only really works for our members in the Southern Hemisphere.

On Thursday 2 December Virginia Postrel will explore the hidden ways textiles have made our world. “The story of humanity is the story of textiles – as old as civilization itself. Textiles created empires and powered invention. They established trade routes and drew nations’ borders. Since the first thread was spun, fabric has driven technology, business, politics, and culture.”

Virginia is the author of The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made The World. This online event begins at 18:00 GMT and you can register for it here.

The next online meeting of the Hajji Baba Club of New York will be on Wednesday 8 December. Dr Mariachiara Gasparini will talk on the subject From Wool to Silk and Back: Development and Evolution of the Eurasian Roundel Motif.

“In the 6th century, roundel motifs began to appear on wool and silk textiles in Chinese and Iranian territories. Through the spreading of Buddhism and Islam in the 8th century, textiles with beaded, lobed, and flowery roundels spread across Eurasia; they have been found in Christian Cathedral treasuries, Egyptian and Japanese repositories, and various archaeological sites. Often used as money by the Chinese, these textiles mainly crossed the borders of empires and kingdoms as diplomatic gifts.”

The talk begins at 18:00 EST, which is 23:00 GMT and is free, but you do need to register for it.

On Thursday 8 December the Fashion and Textile Museum, London, will host another online talk, this time with Victoria Finlay, the author of Fabric: The Hidden History of the Material World. Victoria looks at how stories of our “relationship with cloth are woven in with questions of how and why people through the ages have made it, worn it, invented it, made symbols out of it, and sometimes why they have fought for it.”

Beating tree bark in Papua and attempting to spin cotton in Guatemala are just two of the textile-related experiences Victoria has had, so this should be an enjoyable talk.

Click here to find out more and to book for this talk which begins at 18:00 GMT.

New events

There are so many events coming up that I will be uploading two blogs this week.

©Minjee Kim.

On Thursday 4 November the Korean Cultural Society of Boston will host one of their regular programmes on Korean heritage. The speaker this week will be Dr Minjee Kim and the subject is Han-bok: Dress of Korean Identity. This talk “will shed light on the inception of the term “hanbok” and the composition of the ensembles for men and women, and its constant transformation in the context of modern Korean fashion history. Then it will overview contemporary hanbok ensembles for new-born babies, children, young and middle age adults, as well as weddings, burials, and funerals.” – KCSB website.

For more information click here and to register click here.

Please note that this online event takes place at 19:30 EDT, which is 23:30 GMT – fine for our many North American members but only for night owls in the UK.

Next make a note in your diaries that the proceedings of the 2021 Keimyung International Conference on the Silk Road and Central Asia will be available online from Friday 5 November. The subject of this conference is Textiles From The Silk Road: Origin, Transmission And Exchange. Nine speakers from around the world will present on a wide range of topics including Liao Women’s Dress, Animal Materials in Nomadic Costumes, Silk and Cotton Textiles in Ancient India and Central Asian Textile Motifs in Late Sasanian Art.

Brief summaries of each of the presentations can now be read here, but the videos themselves will not be uploaded until 5 November.

Saturday 6 November is a very busy day for textile lovers!

The Phoebe Hearst Museum will host a Zoom presentation on Asafo flags – these are militia insignia of the Fante states along the southern coast of Ghana. This Zoom event will feature Dr. Gus Casely-Hayford and Karun Thakar in conversation. They will “place Asafo flags within the wider context of global textile arts and reveal how the flags’ seemingly simple patterns can be ‘read’ to reveal aspects of the communities who made them, and the performances in which they played a part.”  – ETC website

To register for this event, which is co-sponsored by the Phoebe Hearst Museum and Tracing Patterns Foundation, click here. It starts at 10:00 PT, which is 17:00 GMT.

A great video of these flags in use, which really brings them to life, and a short talk by Gus Casely-Hayford can be viewed here.

I have blogged about these flags from Karun Thakar’s collection before, when some were exhibited at the Brunei Gallery in London. Over 250 of his flags now form an online exhibition. You can see a high quality enlargement of each flag by clicking on the relevant image.

Before viewing the flags, I would highly recommend reading the excellent short article Proverbs on Parade by Duncan Clarke, written to accompany it. In it he explains that the Asafo were military associations and that the flags are appliqué- and embroidery-decorated cloth banners, which were produced by local specialists.

“Asafo flags are paraded through the fishing villages and towns of the Fante region in a vibrant tradition that depicts a cast of characters blending local mythology with European heraldry. Kings and queens interact with soldiers and musicians, dragons and gryphons, elephants and leopards, whales and sharks, ships, trains and aeroplanes.” – Duncan Clarke.

“Two men stand by a large boiling pot on a fire; one has his hand in the bubbling liquid, telling a rival company ‘it boils but it doesn’t burn’, asserting that the rival company makes a big show but is not actually dangerous.” Text by Duncan Clarke. ©Karun Collection.

Clarke goes on to explain how certain images could only be used by specific groups, and that the use of an image from another group could have dire consequences. He also gives the meaning behind some of these images – many of which are linked to proverbs.

Also taking place on Saturday 6 November is the Rienzi Symposium hosted by the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. This virtual event explores their current exhibition Hidden Hands: Invisible Workers in Industrial England, which is on show until 2 January 2022. This virtual symposium runs from 10:00-15:00 CDT, which is 15:00-20:00 GMT, and you can see the schedule and register here.

As if that’s not enough historian and author John Vollmer will be giving a virtual presentation for the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art the same day, linked to their current exhibition Weaving Splendor: Treasures of Asian Textiles which I have already blogged about. His talk is entitled Why are Textiles Masterpieces? Asian Textiles in Weaving Splendor and takes place at 13:00 CDT, which is 18:00 GMT.

You can register for this free talk here.

The following day, Sunday 7 November Brian Morehouse will be giving a webinar for the New England Rug Society on the subject Yastiks: A Comparative Study of the Designs of Published and Unpublished Examples. Brian is the author of Yastiks: Cushion Covers and Storage Bags of Anatolia and this talk will explore the changing visual language over time within certain yastik groups. The talk will take place at 13:00 ET, which is 17:00 GMT and you can register for it here.

On Tuesday 9 November the Hajji Baba Club of New York will hold their next meeting online via Zoom. The presenter will be Melinda Watt of the Textile Department, Art Institute of Chicago and her subject will be The Blueberry Pie Carpet: A Morris Carpet at Home in Chicago.

The Art Institute of Chicago has one large and important carpet made by Morris & Co. for the Glessner House, which is located in the historic Prairie District neighbourhood of the city. …. This talk will explore the decoration of the Glessner House, centred on the large entry hall carpet, and focused on the influence of historical and Middle Eastern textiles manifested in the carpet and Morris’ work.

Melinda Watt’s first exhibition at the Institute will open on 18 December and is entitled Morris and Company: The Business of Beauty.

This talk will begin at 18:00 EDT, which is 22:00 GMT. Full details and registration are available here.

Image: Xunka Tulan (Navenchauc, San Lorenzo Zinacantán, Chiapas, Mexico); Wedding huipil, commissioned late 1970s; cotton, feathers; Fowler Museum at UCLA, X91.546; Gift of Mrs. Gene Stuart

On Wednesday 10 November the Fowler Museum has organised another in its Curator’s Choice series. Elena Phipps, author of several books on the textile traditions of the Andean people, and Hector M. Meneses Lozano, Director of the Museo Textil de Oaxaca in Mexico, will discuss Feather Embellishments in Mexican Huipiles.

“The program will briefly trace the history of the huipil and highlight some of its special features. Lozano will share some examples from the extensive collection of the Museo Textil de Oaxaca, alongside a few special pieces from the Fowler Museum. The discussion will then focus on a unique group of huipiles woven with spun downy bird feathers.” – Fowler Museum. 

This programme begins at 11:00 PST, which is 19:00 GMT. More details and registration here.

©Victoria Vorreiter.

Gavin Strachan kindly sent me information about this Songs of Memory Journal, written by Victoria Vorreiter, who specialises in documenting spirit intermediaries. There are some remarkable photographs of various ceremonies. Those with a particular interest in the Hmong will enjoy reading her beautifully illustrated article Bridging the Realms of Mortals and Deities. Hmong Spirit Intermediaries and their Numinous Powers.

OATG members may recall that Victoria wrote a long article for our Asian Textiles journal in 2016, which is now available for non-members to read online.

Finally an advance notice of the next OATG meeting. This will be an online presentation by Luz van Overbeeke entitled Japanese Ornamental Textiles Through a Dealer’s Eyes. Luz specialises in ornamental textiles of the Meiji era and will discuss some of the most memorable textiles she has found over the years.

This talk will take place on Thursday 18 November at 18:30 GMT and is free for OATG members. There is a small (£3) charge for non-members. Full details and registration here.

Upcoming textile events

A short blog to highlight some textile events taking place in the next couple of weeks – there is a lot on later in October so I will cover that in another blog.

Want to see one of the rarest textiles in the world? Oliver Hoare Limited in London currently has an exhibition (ending 22 October 2021) called The Natural World and the stand-out pieces are two shawls and a lamba made from golden spider silk from Madagascar. Only four pieces from this silk exist today.

“Estimates for the numbers of spiders necessary to produce silk are astonishing: a single ounce (28 grams) of golden spider silk requires 23,000 spiders. To produce the brocaded textile alone required drawing the silk from the spinnerets of over 1 million spiders.” – gallery website

You can learn a lot more about how these amazing textiles were produced, along with photographs of the different processes involved here.

Example of smocking. © Textile Society

On Thursday 30 September at 13:00-14:00 BST the Textile Society will be hosting a talk entitled Deception and Disguise: Smock Narratives. Alison Toplis will look at “the history of the English smock and how it developed in the 19th century as part of working-class clothing cultures and more specifically menswear. The smock has had a fascinating heritage and Alison will question assumptions about who wore smocks and discuss why they became popular as working attire as well as signifiers of individuality. Join us to hear more about a significant and understated part of English social and costume history.“ – Textile Society website.

Alison is the author of The Hidden History of the Smock Frock in which she traces how it was used in England and also in export markets such as Australia. It’s fascinating that something that was originally a man’s garment has now largely become part of the wardrobe of women and children.

Detail from the cover of his book. © Mark A Johnson

On Saturday 2 October 2021 The Bowers Museum, Santa Ana, California will host an in-person talk by Mark A Johnson on the subject of The Unique Art Forms of the Kayanic People of Borneo. This event will also be available for online attendance. It will take place at 13:30-14:30 PDT, which is 21:30-22:30 BST. Registration is essential.

This talk will be based on Mark’s recently published book The Kayanic Tradition. Kayanic Dayak Art from Borneo. Volume 1: Guardian Sculptures. A preview of a few pages of the book is available here to whet your appetite.

One of the stalls from a previous World Textile Day event.

Also on 2 October is the West of England World Textile Day. The location for this one is Saltford, which is between Bristol and Bath.

Textiles will be available from the following specialists:-

Textile Traders 

African Fabric Shop

Susan Briscoe designs (Japanese)

The Running Stitches (vintage Kantha)

Slow Loris (Chinese tribal minorities)

Treasures from the Silk Road

Fabazaar (Indian)

Textile from the collection of Louise Teague

On Wednesday 6 October at 18:00 BST our friends at ORTS (Oriental Rug & Textile Society) will host an online talk by Louise Teague on her collection of Lakai textiles. If you would like to attend please email Dimity Spiller.

Egyptian tent hangings at a World Textile Day event.

On Saturday 9 October its the South of England World Textile Day in Hampshire. This will be at Brockenhurst in the New Forest.

Textiles will be available from the following specialists:-

Textile Traders 

African Fabric Shop

Susan Briscoe designs

Egyptian Tent Hangings from John & Joan Fisher

Helen Murchie (tweed)

Ruth Smith

Gaynor Williams (animal trappings)

And as if that’s not enough the Textile Society will be hosting their London Antique & Vintage Textile Fair in Chelsea on the following day, 10 October. I’ve never been to the London event, but have been to the Fair they hold in Manchester and it always has an interesting range of textiles.

Children’s Festival Hats, late Qing dynasty (1644-1912) © Bowers Museum

I really enjoyed this blog by the Bowers Museum about Qing Dynasty Children’s Headwear. I was interested to learn that the hats above “functioned as masks to fool evil entities into thinking the child was an animal. Dogs, lions, tigers, and dragons were among the adorably rendered disguises donned by children to scare off even the most sinister spirits. “ – Bowers Museum website. Apparently wearing a hat with cat ears helped children to see evil spirits in the dark and escape from them!

Finally on Tuesday 12 October Elena Phipps will give an online talk on The Andean Textile Tradition of Four-Selvaged Cloth. “A textile with four complete, uncut woven edges, or selvages, is a rare thing in the world of weaving. And yet, it has been a tradition in the Andes for thousands of years. In this presentation, textile expert Elena Phipps will share how Andean cloth with four selvages is precisely planned and woven to a specific size and shape for its intended purpose. The weaver knows exactly what they want to make when the cloth is created. The results are textiles admired for their mastery of color, technique, and design.“ – ATA website

This will take place at 19:00 Eastern Time, which is midnight in the UK, so probably one for our many international members.

Andean textiles, Seminole Indian culture, Shoes in the Age of Enlightenment

Andean textile expert Elena Phipps will be giving a lecture on the subject of Weaving Silver: Brilliance and sheen in Andean colonial textile traditions on Tuesday 27 July at 16:05 BST. This is part of an international, inter-disciplinary conference entitled The Matter of Silver: Substance, Surface, Shimmer, Trauma, which will take place over three consecutive afternoons. Each free session can be booked separately. For more information and registration details please click here.

© Elena Phipps

A new exhibit has opened at Elliott Museum, Stuart, Florida, dedicated to the life and culture of the Seminole Indians. Entitled Seminole People of Florida – Survival and Success it “will focus on the rich material culture that the Seminoles created and sustained during the late 19th and 20th centuries. From isolation in the mid-1800s to the establishment of two sovereign tribes that oversee modern, successful businesses, the Seminole people have experienced an extraordinary journey.” – Knowhere article. The exhibition will run until 4 October 2021.

© Elliott Museum

A new scholarship supporting the study of Asian and African textiles and dress has been established by Karun Thakar, in collaboration with the V&A. Awards of up to £10,000 are available for those studying these subjects both in the UK and internationally. Click here for more details.

The Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto is now open again. They are running a series of virtual tours this summer. This Sunday, 25 July, at 11am Eastern time (16:00 BST) the tour will focus on Footwear in the Age of Enlightenment. It will look at how clothing codified the distinctions between people, and how “a close examination of 18th century footwear reveals a great deal about the power dynamics of the period.” – museum website. More information about the exhibition can be found here. You can register for the online tour here.

Upcoming textile events – Part Two

PLEASE NOTE Subscribers who usually read this blog via their email may need to click on the blue title to access it through our WordPress site instead to enable them to watch the videos. 

As I explained in my previous blog, there are currently so many exciting textile events on the horizon that I have had to split them across two blogs.

Weavers from Fatumnasi village, Timor, Indonesia. © IFAM

The International Folk Art Market in Santa Fe is back!

“Since 2004, the International Folk Art Market has hosted more than 1000 master folk artists from 100 countries in the world’s largest exhibition and sale of works by master folk artists. Artist earnings have exceeded $34 million and impacted more than one million lives in the communities they represent. The Market offers folk artists a respected spot in the global marketplace to gather together and share their handmade traditions and to create economic, social, and individual empowerment.” IFAM website

There are a few changes, with the event spread over a longer period (7-18 July 2021) and attendees booking 2 hour slots – several of which have already sold out! For full details and registration please click here. That link will also take you to a listing of which artists will be participating each week. The video below shows highlights from the 2019 market just to whet your appetite.

The Association of Dress Historians will host its annual New Research in Dress History Conference online from 7-13 June 2021. This special conference will feature 120 speakers across seven days and according to their website it “will be a weeklong ‘festival’ of dress history”!

Illustration of Uzbek dress, © Association of Dress Historians

There will be several panels each day, with thirty minute slots for each speaker. They run from noon until 20:00 BST. It’s important to note that these proceedings are NOT being recorded so this is your only opportunity to hear these presentations. A huge range of topics will be covered:- Uzbek National Dress, Indigenous Vietnamese Dress, Chinese Influence in Swedish Fashion, Chinese Ceremonial Armour, Japanese Motif Dyeing and many, many more. The full list can be accessed here. One ticket entitles you to attend as many sessions as you like, leaving you free to dip in and out of this event. Click here for more information and registration.

A completed doubleweave textile at Tinkuy in 2017. © Andean Textile Arts

On 8 June 2021 Andean Textile Arts will host a talk entitled Peruvian Doubleweave: Past, Present, and Future. The speaker is Jennifer Moore who in 2013 was invited to teach doubleweave to indigenous Quechua weavers in Peru, where they are once again excelling in this technique that had been discontinued after the Spanish conquest. 

“Pre-Columbian Andean weavers were as masterful as any the world has ever known, working on simple backstrap looms but using a wealth of sophisticated techniques. One of these techniques, doubleweave pick-up, was developed in the Andes about 3,000 years ago. While still being done in other parts of the world, doubleweave died out in Peru after the arrival of the Spanish in the fifteenth century.” – Andean Textile Arts website. This talk is at 19:00 EST, which sadly is midnight in the UK. Click here for full details and registration.

Woman’s jacket, blouse and skirt, 1800-1850. © V&A, London.

The Epic Iran exhibition has now opened at the V&A, London to great acclaim – this article in The Guardian, gives a flavour of it. However perhaps the best introduction comes from this Reuters article which also includes a short video of some of the exhibition highlights introduced by co-curator John Curtis.

Don’t forget that Sarah Piram, Curator of the Iranian collections at the V & A, will give an online talk to the OATG next Thursday, 10 June 2021. She will give an overview of some major works, from early silk fragments showing roundels of animals, to Safavid carpets and contemporary craft tradition. Textiles and carpets will be showcased in different parts of the exhibition, and one of the highlights will be the ‘Sanguszko’ carpet which used to belong to the Duke of Buccleuch and Queensberry – one of the greatest seventeenth century Persian carpets in private hands. This talk will take place at 18:30 BST. OATG members should already have received their invitations, and registration is now also open non-members through this link.

On Saturday 12 June 2021 Sumru Belger-Krody will give an online talk hosted by the Textile Museum Associates of Southern California. The subject of this talk, entitled Earthly Beauty, Heavenly Art: Carpets for Prayer, is prayer carpets.

“Among textiles in Islamic society, prayer carpets hold a special place. They beautify spaces, while conveying metaphorical meanings for Muslim worshippers during their obligatory five-times daily prayer. Additionally, prayer carpets have been communicating the distinct aesthetic choices of the individual cultures who created and used them for centuries, while being recognizable as prayer carpets through their very specific design elements. Sumru Belger Krody, Senior Curator, The Textile Museum Collection at The George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum, will discuss the prayer carpet’s universality in terms of its use and certain design aesthetics, followed by a brief description on how diverse Islamic cultures make this textile their own. She will show that certain design elements and their meanings or symbolism are universal, and point to a fluid iconography through time, place, religion, tradition, and culture.” – TMA/SC

Admission is free, but you do need to register for this event which begins at 10:00 PDT, which is 18:00 BST.

‘The nopal plant that is grown in America and produces grana (insect dye).

I had intended including the 15 June talk on cochineal by Elena Phipps here, but have now discovered that it has sold out. For those who have missed out, I’m sharing this link to Elena’s work Cochineal Red: The Art History of a Color, a Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In it she “traces the spread of cochineal red from the Americas, where Mexican and Andean weavers had for centuries been using it to create ritual and ceremonial textiles in deep shades of red and pink, to Europe and then to the Middle East and Asia” – Thomas P. Campbell, Museum Director.

Wonsam, ceremonial robe for women (1799-1850). © Seok Juseon Memorial Museum, Dankook University.

On Friday 18 June 2021 the Saint Louis Art Museum will host an online lecture by Lee Talbot, curator of The George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum. His subject will be Textiles and Women’s Culture in Joseon Dynasty Korea. “For millennia Korean women have invested a tremendous amount of time in textile production, from cultivating and spinning fibers to dyeing, weaving, and sewing. This lecture will present a dazzling selection of garments, accessories, and furnishings from Korean and American museum collections to explore the role of textiles in upper-status women’s lives during the Joseon dynasty. Examined in light of Joseon literature and other visual arts, these fabrics reveal that when women’s personal freedoms were greatly curtailed, textiles could provide a creative, expressive outlet for women’s feelings as well as a valued source of income and store of wealth.” – Museum website.

Unfortunately this event really only works for our non-UK members as it takes place at 19:00 CDT, which is 1am BST. Here is the link to register. For those who can’t attend, this very well-illustrated online exhibition on Women’s Fashion in the Joseon Dynasty should give some insights.

Don’t forget that Chintz: Cotton in Bloom is still on at the Fashion and Textile Museum, London. This exhibition, which was organised by the Fries Museum, Leeuwarden, The Netherlands, showcases 150 examples of chintz from around the world. These range from mittens to wall hangings and from sun hats to mourning dresses. If you missed the curator talk which took place on 9 April 2021 you may be interested to know that it can now be accessed for a small fee here.

“On the panel were Gieneke Arnolli, former curator of Fashion and textiles, Fries Museum Leeuwarden, the Netherlands. As curator of Chintz: Cotton in Bloom Gieneke discussed the collection and conception of this beautiful exhibition and shared some of the history surrounding chintz. Also joining the panel was internationally respected textile expert and author Mary Schoeser, curator of the display Victorian Chintz and its Legacy. Mary offered her illuminating perspective on English Chintz, its development and place in textile history today. ” – FIT

Robe for a male dignitary (boubou riga or agbada), Nigeria, Hausa peoples, late nineteenth century

Dallas Museum of Art currently has an interesting exhibition entitled Moth to Cloth: Silk in Africa. “Throughout the world, silk is used to make cloth and associated with wealth and status, but  this rare, natural fiber is also indigenous to sub-Saharan Africa. Silk was traded between African peoples across the continent and was also imported from Europe, India, China, and the Middle East. This installation of cloths drawn from the DMA permanent collection explores the production of silk and silk textiles in Ghana, Nigeria, and Madagascar.” – museum website

This interview with Dr Roslyn A. Walker, curator of this exhibition, was fascinating and I learned a lot about the various types of silk moths as well as how although “imported silk thread has been replaced by rayon or cotton for over fifty years now, genuine silk remains the material of choice for making prestigious garments that symbolize elevated social/political status, success, and wealth.”

Last year I shared this presentation on the silks of Madagascar, but think it useful to share it again here.fascinating. It is by OATG member Dr Sarah Fee of the Royal Ontario Museum. The quality of the images really enhances the excellent text. The ROM hold 54 Madagascan textiles in their collection, some of which date to the nineteenth century. It was interesting to read of a connection with Omani traders and Indian trade cloths, almost reminiscent of the Silk Road connections. 

I’ve had lots of positive feedback for these blogs, but can only include events that I am aware of. If you do hear of anything relevant please do contact me. I would also like to strongly recommend two other sources of textile events, both compiled by friends of mine. The first of these is the monthly list produced by Cheri Hunter of the Textile Museum Associates of Southern California. To receive this please send an email. The second is compiled by Marilyn Murphy of ClothRoads, and again is produced monthly. Click here to subscribe.

Textiles from Japan, Africa, Bolivia, Tibet, Iran……..

Good news! Some museums are now reopening. Among these is the Östasiatiska Museet in Stockholm.

Their current exhibition, which runs until 15 August 2021, is entitled Boro – The Art of Necessity. On show will be a unique collection of boro objects loaned from the Amuse Museum in Tokyo, as well as newly produced works by Swedish artists. “Ripped, worn, patched and lovingly mended. Boro textiles tell us about the art of surviving on scarce resources in a harsh place. In northern Japan, the winters are cold and the population has historically been poor. Here, among farmers and fishermen, a distinctive female craft was developed in which nothing went to waste.” – museum website.

I like the fact that the textiles have been displayed in such a way that the viewer can see all sides clearly.

Another new exhibition opens in London on Granary Square, King’s Cross on 8 April 2021. This outdoor photography exhibition is called The Silk Road: A Living History . Over 160 images are used to document a journey along this historic trade route undertaken by the photographer in 2019.

Tajik girl dancing in the Pamir mountains. © Christopher Wilton-Steer.

“The exhibition’s linear design creates a physical route for the viewer offering them the chance to travel by proxy…… The show aims to celebrate the diversity of cultural expressions found along the Silk Road, highlight examples of how historical practices, rituals and customs live on today, and also reveal some of the connections between what appear at first glance to be very different cultures. It also seeks to engender interest and understanding between distant cultures and challenge perceptions of less well known and understood parts of the world. Photographs from Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, India, China and elsewhere will feature in the show. Visitors will be able to access additional content including videos and music via QR codes on each panel of the exhibition.” – Christopher Wilton-Steer. The exhibition runs until 16 June 2021.

Outer-kimono for a young woman (uchikake), 1800 – 30, probably Kyoto, Japan. © Image Courtesy of the Joshibi University of Art and Design Art Museum

Registrations are now open for non-members for the OATG’s next exciting talk (£3 donation) which will take place on Thursday 22 April 2021 at 18:30 BST, which should also work out for our many members in the US. The speaker will be Anna Jackson, Keeper of the Asian department at the V&A and curator of their blockbuster exhibition Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk. In this talk Anna will take us on a fascinating journey from the sophisticated culture of seventeenth century Kyoto to the contemporary catwalk and reveal some of the stories behind the exhibition. 

Anna also wrote the introduction to Thomas Murray’s book Textiles of Japan (see my blog of December 2019). In an interview with Jess Cartner-Morley for The Guardian she said her aim in this exhibition was to “overturn the idea of the kimono as static, atrophied object and show it as a dynamic and constantly evolving icon of fashion”. She also discussed the history of the kimono, and cultural appropriation. This is well worth a read to whet your appetite for the talk. In another interview for LOVE magazine Anna talks about the difficulty of acquiring some of the pieces, their fragility, and the challenges in displaying them correctly. The exhibition was in three sections. “It begins by unpicking the social significance and heritage of the kimono in 17th century Japan, moving to consider the kimono and its position across a more international agenda, finishing with the progressive transformation of its comtemporary (sic) identity.” Scarlett Baker, LOVE magazine.

This is certain to be a very popular talk so I strongly suggest you register for it as soon as possible via this link. If you are enjoying our programme of talks why not consider becoming a member?

“Furisode with Wave and Crane Design, Made for Nishimura Tokuko, the fourteenth Madame Nishimura” by Chiso Co., Ltd, 1938. Yuzen-dyeing and embroidery on woven silk.

Those with a serious interest in kimono will be delighted to hear of not one, but two more exhibitions dedicated to that topic, both at the Worcester Art Museum, Massachusetts. The first of these is an online exhibition entitled Kimono Couture: The Beauty of Chiso. This exhibition is organised by the Worcester Art Museum in partnership with Chiso, a 465-year-old kimono design and production house based in Kyoto, Japan. I highly recommend spending some time ‘visiting’ this exhibition. It is divided into eleven parts, covering topics such as design, symbolism and decorative techniques. Clicking on each part will bring up much more information and a video.

Itō Shinsui (1898–1972), Woman with Marumage Hairstyle, 1924, Publisher: Watanabe Shōzaburō, color woodblock print on mica (kirazuri) ground, Gift of Edward Kenway, 1960.7

The second exhibition opened on 6 February 2021 and will end on 2 May 2021. It is entitled The Kimono in Print: 300 Years of Japanese Design and looks at the kimono as a source of design and inspiration through seventy prints. “Print artists from 17th to 20th -century Japan documented ever-evolving trends in fashion, popularized certain styles of dress, and even designed kimonos. The works begin with early prints from the late 17th century, when a more complex and sophisticated attitude towards clothing first appeared, as seen in the lavish prints of the floating world’s celebrity kabuki actors and courtesans. Modern design books and prints from the early 20th century, inspired by or made for kimono, demonstrate how the boundaries between print and textile fashion and design became more fluid.” – museum website. Monika Bincsik of the Metropolitan Museum of Art will give an online talk entitled Kimono Fashion in Kyoto at 18:00 EDT on Thursday 15 April. That works well for our US members, but UK members should note that this starts at 23:00 BST!

An interesting article by Karla Klein Albertson giving the background to these two exhibitions appeared in Antiques and the Arts Weekly. Another very detailed article just looking at the prints appeared in Asian Art newspaper.

Image: Bisa Butler, Broom Jumpers, 2019. Cotton, silk, wool and velvet, 221 cm x 132.7 cm.

In my most recent blog I wrote about an event on 7 April hosted by Selvedge, which has a panel of speakers looking at the subject of African wax prints. They have now added the extraordinary quilt artist Bisa Butler to the list of speakers for that event. Click here for full details and how to book. A reminder that two events linked to the upcoming Chintz exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum take place online on 8th and 9th April – see my previous blog for full details.

Haida and Kwakwaka’wakw artist Meghann O’Brien wearing the Sky Blanket she wove from mountain goat wool

Next Thursday, 8 April 2021 the Fowler Museum will host a conversation with artist Meghann O’Brien and textile scholar Elena Phipps about Indigenous knowledge and creative practice. “Meghann O’Brien is a Haida and Kwakwaka’wakw artist whose Chilkat textiles are based on the knowledge and artistic practices of her ancestors. Her projects engage specialized techniques of basketry and weaving, and use mountain goat wool, cedar bark, and other earthly materials to connect to the rhythms and patterns of the natural world. With these materials, she explores issues related to Indigenous fashion and couture, reframing the past and applying it to present-day life. ” – Fowler Museum.

This event takes place at 11:00 PDT , which is 19:00 in the UK. It is free, but you do need to register for it. There is also an interesting article in Mountain Life Media, which gives more background into how Meghann began weaving and the creation of her Sky Blanket. The short video shows how the blanket moves when worn.

© Cheri Hunter

On Saturday 10 April Cheri Hunter, the dynamic President of the Textile Museum Associates of Southern California, will be the speaker at their next event. Her topic will be the Textiles, Costumes & Pile Trappings of the Eastern Grasslands of Tibet. Cheri’s background is in film editing in Hollywood and she certainly brings that artistic eye to her photography. She has written many articles with photo-spreads for Hali. This illustrated talk “will emphasize both the local and imported textiles, costumes and pile horse trappings in use throughout the Kham and Amdo grasslands, as well as in shaman rituals and horse competitions, where all of the participants, including the horses, are dressed in their finest…… Please note that this program is a cultural travelogue rather than a scholarly program, with an emphasis on the textiles, costumes and horse trappings worn in festivals.” – Cheri Hunter. The talk takes place at 10:00 PDT, which is 18:00 in the UK. More details and registration here.

The Andean Textile Arts organisation will be hosting a talk on 13 April entitled Renewing Value in Southern Bolivia’s Textiles. The speaker will be Kevin Healy, who will introduce the audience to Antropologos del Surandino (ASUR). “ASUR is a Bolivian cultural foundation that has pioneered efforts to revitalize the Andean textile traditions in southern Bolivia. Since the late 1980s, ASUR has developed community-based programs that provide a way for the region’s rural indigenous weavers to continue creating and producing their beautiful Andean designs. Kevin will discuss how ASUR ’s work has provided a commercial outlet for the weavers in the capital city of Sucre, while also establishing a textile museum visited by multitudes of Bolivian schoolchildren and national and foreign tourists.” – ATA. The talk begins at 19:00 EDT, which is midnight in the UK – one for the night owls!

Carpets in the Bardini Museum, Florence

Next, one for the carpet lovers. On Thursday 15 April the New York-based Hajji Baba Club will host Alberto Boralevi who will talk about Stefano Bardini and the International Carpet Trade at the end of the Nineteenth Century. Bardini was an Italian antiques dealer based in Florence who handled many historical carpets, building up relationships with prominent collectors and museums. Twenty-two such carpets are housed in the Museo Stefano Bardini in Florence. The Bardini archives have a collection of over six thousand original negatives which show most of the objects which passed through his hands. To register for this talk, which takes place at 11:00 EDT (16:00 BST), please contact Elisabeth Parker, Vice-President of the Hajji Baba Club, using this form.

Camel chest band (detail), Qashqa’i people. Collection of Fred Mushkat

On Saturday 24 April Fred Mushkat, author of Weavings of Nomads in Iran: Warp-faced Bands and Related Textiles, will talk about the Weavings of Nomads in Iran as part of the Textile Museum Rug and Textile Appreciation series. “Warp-faced bands, containers and covers are among the rarest and least studied of all weavings made by nomads in Iran…… In this illustrated talk, collector and researcher Fred Mushkat will provide an introduction to these weavings, focusing on different warp-faced structures, how and why these structures were used, which nomads made them and how to distinguish one nomadic group’s work from another. Mushkat will also explore design repertoire, function and the importance of these textiles to the women who made them. ” – Textile Museum website. The talk takes place at 11:00 EDT which is 16:00 BST and you can register for it here.   You may also be interested in a blog I wrote in February on Nomads and their culture in Iran and Kazakhstan, which gave links to several articles and books on this subject.

A plethora of new talks and exhibitions!

It was a pleasure to see so many members take part in our recent AGM, and even more so that several of our overseas members were able to present textiles from their collections at the Show and Tell.

February certainly looks like being a busy month with lots of online talks and exhibitions. I’m listing them here in date order, as sadly several of them take place on the same date.

On 20 February there are no less than three online talks that I am aware of! The first of these is hosted by the Textile Museum, with Lawrence Kearney looking at American Coverlets for Rug Lovers. “In this virtual talk, carpet and textile dealer Lawrence Kearney will explore the varied art form of American wool coverlets from 1780 to 1830.

Woollen coverlets from the early 19th century are one of the great American art forms. They are often beautiful, plentiful and affordable. They were made, primarily, by itinerant weavers who travelled throughout New England and the Midwest from c. 1810 through the 1840s. After introducing the four main types of coverlets — over-shot, double-weave, winter-and-summer, and Jacquard-loomed (“figured and fancy”) — Kearney will explore the pleasures these 200-year-old woollen textiles can hold for rug lovers.” Textile Museum website.

Space for this session is limited so you are encouraged to register early.

A woman in Houaphan Province, Laos, models the hand-reeled silk, naturally dyed shaman cloth she wove on her handbuilt loom. ©Above The Fray.

Next is a Zoom Panel presented by WARP (Weave A Real Peace). This will take place at 1300 EST, which is 1800 in the UK. The panel will consist of Gunjan Jain, who “made a conscious switch from working for fast fashion industries to slow, sustainable fashion and set up Vriksh, a design studio that collaborates with handloom weavers in Odisha and other states in India.  Uddipana Goswami …. a feminist peace researcher turned peace entrepreneur who promotes eco-conscious traditional/indigenous crafts from India’s conflict-ravaged Northeast periphery, and Maren Beck, [who with] her husband Joshua founded Above the Fray: Traditional Hill Tribe Art in 2007 in order to document, support, and introduce to the world the incredible traditional textiles arts and cultures of Laos and Vietnam.” Maren and Joshua are the co-authors of Silk Weavers of Hill Tribe Laos. This talk is free, but registration is essential!

If rugs are more your thing then the talk hosted by the New England Rug Society might be for you. This also takes place at 1300 EST on 20 February, when Alberto Levi will speak on Rugs of the Golden Triangle. “While in Tibet in the early ’90s, hunting, in his words, “for the next Seljuk animal carpet,” Alberto Levi “stumbled across an entirely different kind of animal.” In time, what seemed to be a casual encounter yielded a distinct group of carpets, which Alberto labels “Tibetan Golden Triangle.” Far from being Tibetan, this elusive family of rugs, most of them fragmentary, appears to originate from a triangular region defined at its extremes by eastern Anatolia, the southern Caucasus, and Northwest Persia. How and why these rugs ended up in Tibet is yet another part of the mystery that Alberto will investigate in his talk. ” NERS Newsletter. NERS members will automatically receive a link. Non-members wishing to attend should email committee member Jean Hoffman to receive theirs.

Temple hanging, artist unknown, Gujarat 20th century

On Monday 22 February the Fowler Museum will host one of its regular Lunch and Learn sessions. Joanna Barrkman, the Fowler’s Senior Curator of Southeast Asia and Pacific Arts, will explore embroidered Jain temple and shrine hangings that offer insights into the religious beliefs and imagery of the Jain faith. This short talk will take place at 1430 PST which is 2230 GMT. Click here to register for this free event.

In addition to all of the above there is also the series of four talks hosted by the Textile Museum Journal that I covered in my previous blog. These are:- Elena Phipps on Brilliance, Colour and the Manipulation of Light in Andean textile Traditions (17th) , Raquel Santos and colleagues on Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Asian Textiles in Portuguese Collections (24th) and Walter Denny on Colour, Expectations and Authenticity in Oriental Carpets (26th). The talk by Dominique Cardon on Dyers’ Notebooks in Eighteenth Century England and France, which was scheduled for 10 February has been cancelled. However the good news is that one of Dr Cardon’s co-researchers, Dr Anita Quye, will now take her place for this talk on 10 March instead.

Buddhist robe (kesa), flowers in baskets. Japan, Edo period (1615-1868). Silk and gold brocade. ©Alan Kennedy

Don’t forget that the following day, Saturday 27 February, the Textile Museum Associates of Southern California will host an online talk by Alan Kennedy entitled Kesa: ‘Patchwork’ Buddhist Monks’ Robes in Japan, From Austere to Luxurious. This will take place at 10am Pacific time which is 1800 in the UK. “Kesa is the Japanese word for the traditional patchwork garment worn by Buddhist monks and nuns. These garments are among the earliest documented articles of clothing in Japan, based on inventory records dating to the 8th century. The history of kesa in Japan is of significance for both sacred and secular reasons. They served as a vehicle for both the transmission of Buddhism and of luxury textiles to Japan from the Asian mainland. Kesa that have been preserved in Japan are made of a wide variety of materials, ranging from monochrome bast fibre to sumptuous imported gold brocades. ….. This talk will survey kesa from its earliest history to modern times.” TMA/SC. Registration for this talk is available here.

Ensemble from Southern Moravia in Slovakia (KSUM 1995.17.574 a-e)

A new exhibition opened this week at Kent State University Museum, which will run until 19 December 2021. Entitled Stitched: Regional Dress Across Europe this exhibition showcases common features shared by regional costume across Europe. “In its original context in villages, regional dress carefully marked social and cultural differences. Religious affiliation, gender, age, and marital status were all instantly recognisable at a glance by members of the community. A person’s outfit signalled which village or region they came from. Focusing on these signs of difference obscures the common vocabulary that rural residents across Europe used to shape their clothing. By organising the pieces on display according to shared features, this exhibition highlights the commonalities across the continent rather than their differences. The pieces on view span Western and Eastern Europe including examples from Norway, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Romania and Albania. The development of elaborate regional dress was not a result of the isolation of their wearers but a signal of their integration into broader European society.” KSU website.

Quilt depicting scenes of domestic life and biblical scenes. Created by Minnie Melissa Burdick in 1876. ©Shelburne Museum

The Shelburne Museum in Vermont was the first to exhibit quilts as works of art. Most of the pieces in their collection were produced in New England in the nineteenth century. They recently launched a new online exhibition entitled Pattern and Purpose: American Quilts, which features high-quality images of a selection of their quilts, along with detailed background information on each one. There is also an excellent video in which Katie Wood Kirchhoff previews the exhibition and explains more about the history of the collection and about certain specific quilts. The catalogue of quilt patterns produced by the Ladies Art Company certainly made me smile.

Women’s festive headdress called a shamshur. End of the 19th century Sami, Arkhangel. ©REM

The Russian Museum of Ethnography has a new mini-exhibition which will run until 28 February. The subject is Glass Decor in the Traditional Costume of the Peoples of the Baltic and Barents Regions. The exhibition showcases textiles which are adorned using different types of glass decorations and were made in the second half of the eighteenth to the early nineteenth century. The quality of the images is very good, and there is a toggle at the top of the page to change the language to English.

Early 20th century. Leather, satin, silk, wool and metal thread embroidery, weaving tassels. Artisan Saadagul Mademinova, Southern Kyrgyzstan

The ethnographic collection of the Gapar Aitiev Kyrgyz National Museum of Fine Arts is highlighted in this article in Voices on Central Asia. In it Mira Djangaraсheva, the ex-director of the museum, Aigul Mambetkazieva, the chief conservator, and Chinara Daniyarova, a conservator, tell the story of the museum and describe some of its exhibits. The collection currently consists of over 18,000 items, including embroidered wall panels, felts, a fantastic pair of embroidered leather riding trousers and much, much more. Do take a look!

OATG member Sarah Fee, Senior Curator, Global Fashion and Textiles at the Royal Ontario Museum has informed us of the decision to extend the deadline for the IARTS Textiles of India grant until 15 May 2021. This biennial grant of $15,000 CAD “can be used anywhere in the world by anyone in the world toward a project that enhances knowledge about Indian textiles, dress, or costume”. The scope really is very broad, and can include research, fieldwork and creative work. Please click here for full details of how to apply.

Removing the bindings from the warp threads on Savu. ©David Richardson

Don’t forget the February issue of Asian Textiles will be out later this month. Our next online talk will be on 20 March when Genevieve Duggan will speak on People without history in eastern Indonesia, powerful or powerless? This will focus on the island of Savu, where Genevieve has conducted research over several decades. More details in my next blog!

T M Journal Interview Series, Chintz and Japanese Kesa.

This Wednesday, 27 January, OATG member Sarah Fee of the Royal Ontario Museum will discuss  the exciting revivals and innovations taking place today in India’s unique art of painting cottons using the kalam pen and natural dyes with Renuka Reddy of Bengaluru. The event, entitled Chintz Today: Breathing New Life into Traditional Textile Design, will take place at 1600 EDT which is 2100 in the UK. Further details and registration can be found here.

Hand painted mordant and resist dyed cloth by Renuka Reddy

Many of you will be familiar with the Textile Museum Journal which is published annually. It is peer-reviewed and always features a range of articles from a variety of scholars and textile experts. The most recent edition, published in autumn 2020, was guest edited by Dr Mary Dusenbury and is on the subject of colour.

A series of online interviews has been organised with some of the contributors to this edition. These interviews will take place during February and will “discuss the importance of recent advances in dye analysis, the value of collaborative, interdisciplinary research, and the multiple roles that a study of color can play in understanding a textile and shedding light on its historical and cultural context.” – Textile Museum Journal email.

There will be a total of 4 interviews, each taking place at 12pm eastern time, which is 1700 in the UK. You can register for each one individually.

The first interview will be on Wednesday 10th February and features dye specialist Dr Dominique Cardon. Dr. Cardon will discuss her research on three dyers who made significant contributions to colour and dyeing technology.

“Together with collaborators Iris Brémaud, Anita Quye and Jenny Balfour Paul, Dr. Cardon conducted a comprehensive study of notebooks compiled by three different dyers between 1722 and 1747 in London and Languedoc, France. In this interview, she will reflect on the similarity of their palettes, the virtuosity of the dyers as colorists, their shared technical language, and the scientific accuracy of the colors in their portfolios.” – Textile Museum website. For more information on the work of Dr Cardon see my earlier blog.

Man’s ponchito (detail), 19th century. The Fowler Museum 2011.36.11. Gift of Connirae and Steve Andreas. Photo by Don Cole.

The second interview will take place one week later, on Wednesday 17 February. Dr Elena Phipps will discuss “the Andean predilection for textiles that reflect light” with Dr Mary Dusenbury. Dr Phipps has written prolifically on textiles of the Andes and a selection of her work can be found here.

Vine-scroll design carpet (detail), Iran, 17th century. Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga 10Tp.

The subject of the interview the following week (on Wednesday 24 February) is Oriental carpets found in Portuguese collections. Dr Dusenbury will be joined by Raquel Santos, Blythe McCarthy, Maria João Ferreira and Ana Claro, co-authors of three of the papers in the Journal.

Anhalt Carpet (detail), Iran, 1500-1550. The Metropolitan Museum of Art 46.128. Gift of Samuel H. Kress Foundation, 1946.

Please note that the final interview is NOT the following Wednesday, but will take place on Friday 26 February. This will be with Dr Walter Denny who “will explore the controversies and difficulties surrounding any study of color in pile carpets by art historians, conservators and photographers….. and….how scholarly expectations of color in the various historical eras and geographic groups of carpets are shaped by what has survived of old traditions.”

Buddhist Priest’s Vestment (Kesa) with Phoenix, Japan, Edo period (1615–1868), Date 19th century, Japan, Silk and metallic thread tapestry, Overall: 44 x 80 in. (111.8 x 203.2 cm). Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

The following day, Saturday 27 February, the Textile Museum Associates of Southern California will host an online talk by Alan Kennedy entitled Kesa: ‘Patchwork’ Buddhist Monks’ Robes in Japan, From Austere to Luxurious. This will take place at 10am Pacific time which is 1800 in the UK. “Kesa is the Japanese word for the traditional patchwork garment worn by Buddhist monks and nuns. These garments are among the earliest documented articles of clothing in Japan, based on inventory records dating to the 8th century. The history of kesa in Japan is of significance for both sacred and secular reasons. They served as a vehicle for both the transmission of Buddhism and of luxury textiles to Japan from the Asian mainland. Kesa that have been preserved in Japan are made of a wide variety of materials, ranging from monochrome bast fibre to sumptuous imported gold brocades. ….. This talk will survey kesa from its earliest history to modern times.” TMA/SC. Registration for this talk is available here.

More online talks and an exhibition….

OATG members who were unable to attend the recent talk by Nick Fielding – or indeed those who would like to see it again – will be pleased to hear that a recording of this has now been added to our website. Simply go to Events Programme – Online Events – and then enter the password for 2020. This is shown on the inside back cover of our Asian Textiles journal, or contact any committee member for details. A digital copy of the December Lockdown Newsletter has also been added under the Journals section of the website, and again you will need the password to access this.

A reminder of two talks taking place this Saturday 9th January. The first is organised by the Textile Museum, Washington and features Sylvia Fraser-Lu on Burman Textiles. For full details see my blog of 23rd December. Click here to register.

The second event is hosted by the Textile Museum Associates of Southern California. Craig Diamond will speak on two types of textiles from Mindanao in the Philippines. See my blog of 18th August for a video of Craig talking about these warp ikat cloths known as T’nalak and woven by the Tboli people from banana fibre. Click here to register for this free event.

On Saturday 23rd January Ann Marie Moeller will discuss Small Japanese Treasures from the Lloyd Cotsen Collection at the Textile Museum. Click here for full details and how to register for this free talk.

Artist Unknown (Chancay or Rimac, central coast Peru); Panel with crowned figures bearing staffs; Fowler Museum at UCLA, X65.8730; Gift of the Wellcome Trust

On Monday 25th January the Fowler Museum in Los Angeles will be hosting a short online talk by Elena Phipps on the subject of a Peruvian cloth woven with four selvedges. This is part of their Lunch & Learn series, but it will be at 8pm in the UK.

Don’t forget we have our own AGM on Saturday 30th January. The formal part of the meeting will be followed by a short Show and Tell of textiles from members’ collections. This is the first time we will have held this event online, so we are seizing this opportunity to invite our overseas members to present one of their textiles. We look forward to “virtually” meeting you all.

Lama’s ceremonial hat, Tibet, early 20th century. ©Matthew Hillman.

Finally I enjoyed many of the images in this online exhibition about headwear. Curated by Stacey W. Miller, The Global Language of Headwear: Cultural Identity, Rites of Passage, and Spirituality has wonderful examples of headwear from across the globe. This exhibition should have currently been touring several museums in the US. As that has not been possible it has instead been made available online. Several of the images are accompanied by short videos, providing more information about how and when the hats were worn.