Arctic batik exhibition, Egyptian appliqué and Palestinian embroidery.

A new exhibition opens later this week in Berne, Switzerland. The Museum Cerny will be showing a collection of batiks, created in the 1970s by Inuit artists from Nunavik in the far north of Quebec, Canada. I was really surprised to hear of this use of a textile tradition, that I associate with Asia and Africa, by indigenous artists in Canada.

©Museum Cerny

Apparently in 1973 the artist Chinkok Tan, who was born in Malaysia, held workshops at Great Whale River and introduced local artists to this technique. The pieces created then show real confidence, but sadly the production of more batik pieces never took off due to a lack of materials. The exhibition will run until 26 September 2021. An interesting article by the museum co-director Martin Schultz, with more images of these striking batiks, can be found here.

Caribou, 1973, Annie Mikpigak. ©Museum Cerny

The Institute of Islamic Studies at the University of Toronto have just opened the registration for another event in their series Crafting Conversations: Discourses on the Craft Heritage of the Islamic World – Past, Present and Future.

Master craftsman Tarek El Safty at work. © Ola Seif

Seif El Rashidi, Director of the Barakat Trust, will speak on the subject From Craft To Art: Egyptian Appliqué-work in Light of Local and Global Changes. He is the co-author (with Sam Bowker) of The Tentmakers of Cairo: Egypt’s Medieval and Modern Applique Craft (AUC Press, 2018). This conversation with Dr Fahmida Suleman (Royal Ontario Museum) and Dr Heba Mostafa (University of Toronto) “explores the over one thousand-year-old tradition of textile appliqué work (khayamiyya) in Egypt, which continues to thrive in the ‘Street of the Tentmakers’ in the heart of historic Cairo’s bustling centre.” – website. This free event takes place on Saturday 27 March at 11:00 EST, which is 15:00 in the UK. Full details and registration here.

Recordings of previous conversations in this series are available here. I particularly enjoyed the one by Omar Nasser-Khoury on Embroidery from Palestine. Omar is one of the co-authors of Seventeen Embroidery Techniques from Palestine.

Please note:- This event is part of an eight-part monthly series entitled “Crafting Conversations: Discourses on the Craft Heritage of the Islamic World – Past, Present and Future,” an initiative of the Islamic Art and Material Culture Collaborative (IAMCC), Toronto, Canada. For more information on the series and the IAMCC, please visit their website. This event will be held via Zoom. If you have any questions or want to be added to the IAMCC mailing list please email Dr Fahmida Suleman of the Royal Ontario Museum.

Upcoming textile events – exhibitions, online lectures and symposia

 

We have had some very encouraging feedback on the video that Chris Buckley and Sandra Sardjono made exclusively available for OATG members until 1 October. Our next Lockdown Newsletter is well under way, but our editor Gavin Strachan is always keen for new material for both the Newsletter and the Journal. If you have any ideas for an article or perhaps a short piece about a favourite textile please email him directly.

 

Woman’s hat or ládjogahpir, Sámi, Norway. Wool, horn, cotton and silk, pre-1919. © British Museum

The British Museum has now reopened and their major exhibition entitled Arctic culture and climate will start on 22 October and run until 21 February 2021. This looks fascinating and I’m sure we will hear more of it shortly from our chair Helen Wolfe as she has been closely involved with this exhibition in her position as Textiles Collection Manager. I was interested to learn more about the hat depicted above. Apparently use of these hats declined around 1870 because “missionaries, who interpreted the horn as representing the devil, considered them sinful” (BM website).

The Pitt Rivers Museum has in its collection a portrait dated circa 1873 of a Saami woman wearing one of these hats, which Arthur Evans described as like “Minerva’s helmet, exquisitely graceful”.

Man’s snow-spectacles. Reindeer skin, metal, glass beads, uranium beads. Dolgan, Russia, before 1879. © British Museum

There are several excellent relevant blogs on the British Museum website. My favourite of these was 10 things you need to live in the Arctic  , which has some wonderful images of textiles. Tickets are not yet available, but I will ensure members are informed as soon as they are.

 

Woollen tunic from an 8th century tomb in Niger
Institut de Recherches en Sciences Humaines, Université Abdou Moumouni de Niamey, Niger

The Met Fifth Avenue has now also reopened, giving visitors a final opportunity to see the Sahel: Art and Empires on the Shores of the Sahara exhibition which ends on 26 October 2020.  The history of this region will be illuminated through more than two hundred items. The majority of these will be sculptures, but there are also about 30 textiles including some very rare ancient indigo examples that were preserved in the Tellem Caves in Mali (information from Elena Phipps). Do scroll down the page to the images of the exhibition objects where you are able to click on each one to bring up the full details of the item.

The Textile Society of America holds a biennial symposium, which this year was due to take place in Boston. Obviously that could not happen, so a virtual symposium has been organised instead. This is actually a great opportunity for many of our UK members who would not otherwise have been able to attend. Even better, you do not need to be a member of the TSA to register for these events – though obviously if you enjoy them you may well wish to consider joining. The theme of the symposium is Hidden Stories/Human Lives. It takes place from 15-17 October 2020 and registration is now open. Full Symposium registration gives you access to twelve concurrent sessions, keynote and plenary sessions, and film sessions. There are a range of rates, including a heavily discounted one for students, making this extremely good value. Click here for full details of how to register, and here for full details of the programme.

There are 12 concurrent sessions, featuring a range of speakers from across the globe. Topics are very diverse with the textile traditions of the Andes, Mexico, Africa, Japan, India, Cambodia and China among those covered.

 

Dr Sam Bowker with the Syme Panels, photograph by Kylie Esler (2015)

As part of their response to Covid, the William Rolland Gallery of Fine Art at the California Lutheran University hosted a series of online lectures. These have now all been made available online. This one by Sam Bowker in particular caught my eye. Sam is an expert on the textile art of ‘khayamiya’, Egyptian appliqués produced by the tentmakers of Cairo. This hour-long presentation “brings together the stories of the tentmakers and their extraordinary tents – from the huge tent pavilions, or suradiq, of the streets of Egypt, to the souvenirs of the First World War and textile artworks celebrated by quilters around the world. It traces the origins and aesthetics of the khayamiya textiles that enlivened the ceremonial tents of the Fatimid, Mamluk, and Ottoman dynasties, exploring the ways in which they challenged conventions under new patrons and technologies, inspired the paper cut-outs of Henri Matisse, and continue to preserve a legacy of skilled handcraft in an age of relentless mass production. ” (WRG website). You can access the video through following this link. The list of the full series of lectures can be viewed here.

 

Chinese textile to protect children against “dangerous forces”. © USC Pacific Asia Museum

The USC Pacific Asia Museum will be hosting an online event looking at Protective Textiles in the USC PAM Collection. The curator, Dr Rebecca Hall, will “explore textiles made to help children survive against dangerous forces in China; jackets constructed to keep a fireman safe in Japan; and an undershirt inscribed with symbols to keep its wearer safe in Myanmar. Click here for more details of how to register for this event which takes place on Tuesday 22 September at 20:00 BST.

 

Sample of cloth with Japan-inspired decoration, Europe, mid-20th century. Courtesy Textile Research Centre, Leiden. TRC 2010.0493

Finally I would like to suggest another useful resource for members. ClothRoads have a monthly blog of interesting textile events, written by my friend Marilyn Murphy. Sometimes, inevitably, we both list the same exhibition, but often there are differences. In her most recent blog Marilyn includes an online exhibition of Russian quilts and another on Macedonian costume. She also provides links to an online exhibition at the Textile Research Centre in Leiden entitled Out of Asia. I saw this exhibition last year when I attended the ICAS conference and am sure members will enjoy this virtual viewing of it. I recommend signing up to the ClothRoads blog to get their monthly guide (there is an option to subscribe in the top left corner of your browser).

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Textile tidbits

 

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

This week members of the OATG were scheduled to visit the Mediterranean Threads exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. For obvious reasons this was not possible. However a virtual tour has now been made available online.

Linen and silk bed valance fragment with cockerel. Northern Sporades, 18th century. EA1960.153. ©Ashmolean Museum.

Mediterranean Threads – Greek Embroideries 1700-1900 AD gives us a flavour of the hugely diverse textiles being created across the Greek islands and mainland using a variety of techniques. As houses often consisted of just one room, bed curtains were essential to provide some privacy. These provided an ideal way to decorate the home and showcase the skill of the occupants. The exhibition also looks at possible links between the Greek embroidery and that of the Egyptians, and trade links with Venice and other areas. I was struck by the similarity between a textile from Naxos and the embroidery I have previously seen in Fez, Morocco. Do make sure you click to see the images in full screen to fully appreciate them.

Douwe Klaas Wielenga (1880-1942) of the Dutch Reformed Church.

From a current exhibition to one that ended decades ago. Leven en Dood op Sumba (Life and Death on Sumba) was an exhibition held at the Museum of Ethnology in Rotterdam in 1965/66. The majority of the exhibits were collected by the missionary Douwe Klaas Wielenga between 1904 and 1921 and have been held by the museum ever since. A 32 page introduction to the exhibition was written by the late Monni Adams.

This is a great opportunity to see a collection of textiles with a well-documented provenance. Please note – I copied this video a couple of years ago and omitted to note where it came from. I have searched unsuccessfully to find the source, so uploaded the video myself. If anyone can tell me the original source I will obviously link to that instead.

19th century Ainu robe made from elm bark fibre and cotton. ©Thomas Murray

I’ve written previously about Textiles of Japan: The Thomas Murray Collection – a weighty tome in every sense. An interesting article about this book and its author by Andrea Marechal Watson can be found here. Ainu robes are very striking and were made using a variety of materials including nettles, hemp, salmon skin, cotton and elm bark.

A wonderful set of photos of contemporary Ainu people by Laura Liverani was produced for an exhibition which took place in Sydney last year. I was particularly drawn to the image of Kazunobu Kawanano, an elder photographed outside of his home wearing a traditional robe.

 

Another exciting development is the opening of the new museum in Hokkaido prefecture celebrating Ainu culture – thanks to Tom Murray for sharing this information. This video was taken last week when local people were invited in small groups to see the museum before it opens to the public – date to be confirmed.

 

This photo of the exhibition gives some idea of the size of the pieces.

The Historical and Ethnographical Museum in Switzerland has now reopened its doors and has an exhibition entitled Manzandaran Kilims: Unknown Flat Fabrics from Northern Persia. A few examples of these strikingly modern textiles can be seen in this article in Selvedge. These kilims were created in around 1900 and have a real freshness and vibrancy.

And finally the Californian Lutheran University will be hosting a webinar tomorrow evening (19 June 2020) by Dr Sam Bowker who will be discussing the Tentmakers of Cairo. The good news for those of you in the wrong time zone is that the lecture is being recorded and will be available to view online this weekend. Go to the university website for more details.

 

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Events: Worldwide textile events in November

I usually list the events that I am aware of in date order but sometimes, as is the case this month, a theme jumps out and it makes more sense to group those events together.

Tents set up for a Fair, 1907. Barratt, Reginald, 1861-1917 Creative Commons

Several exhibitions and talks are on the subject of Egypt, the first of these being the talk by Professor Sam Bowker to the Textile Museum Associates of Southern California on 16 November looking at The Tentmakers of Cairo and Egyptian Tentmaker Appliqué in American Collections.

“In the crowded centre of historic Cairo lies a covered market with wonderful textiles sewn by hand in brilliant colours and intricate patterns. This is the Street of the Tentmakers, the home of the spectacular cotton-on-canvas Egyptian appliqué technique art known as khayamiya. Their breathtaking urban pavilions connect the splendour of the Fatimids and Mamluks, the cut-outs of Henri Matisse, and the souvenirs of world wars. A co-author of the book The Tentmakers of Cairo, Sam Bowker brings together the stories of the tentmakers and their extraordinary creations, from the huge tent pavilions, or suradiq, of the streets of Egypt, to the souvenirs of WWI. Tracing the origins and aesthetics of these textiles, Sam will explore the ways in which they challenged conventions, and continue to preserve a skilled handicraft in an age of mass production.” TMA/SC Newsletter.

Details:
Saturday 16 November 10:30. Luther Hall, Lower Level St. Bede’s Episcopal Church, 3590 Grand View Blvd. Los Angeles. Members free, guests $10. Please note reservations to attend this talk are required by Wednesday 13 November. Please email info@tmasc.org.

 

Fragment with head and duck in a jewelled trellis, Egypt, early 5th century. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection

Continuing the theme is the current exhibition at the Textile Museum in Washington DC entitled Woven Interiors: Furnishing Early Medieval Egypt. The exhibition showcases 45 exceptional interior textiles from the villas, palaces, churches, mosques, and homes of late antique and early medieval Egypt. A gallery guide can be accessed here.

Hanging with erotes, animals, heads, and garlands (detail), eastern Mediterranean, 4th–5th century. The Textile Museum.

In addition to the exhibition a colloquium entitled New Threads: Recent Research on Egyptian Textiles will take place on Saturday 9 November.

“Inspired by new exhibitions on the fashion and furnishings of early medieval Egypt, this colloquium features new research from five distinguished scholars that will challenge your concepts of these ancient textile artworks. The program also includes curator-led tours of both exhibitions and a first look at the new Cotsen Textile Traces Study Center.” Textile Museum website.  Registration details and a list of topics and speakers can be found here.

Lori Kartchner will give a gallery talk on the use of flax in these textiles on Thursday 21 November – details here.

 

Fragment of a Coptic textile; 5th–6th cent.; Upper Egypt. © Tomaž Lauko

The final exhibition relating to Egypt is in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Entitled Coptic Textiles from the Collection of the National Museum of Slovenia it presents 53 textiles made by the Christian population in Egypt from the 3rd to the late 7th century.

Details:
National Museum of Slovenia – Metelkova, Museum Quarter Metelkova, Maistrova ulica 1, Ljubljana. Closed Mondays.

 

Duccio di Buoninsegna, Rucellai Madonna, ca. 1285, Uffizi Gallery, Florence

The next theme is Islamic textiles. OATG member Dr Federica Gigante will be giving a talk on  Islamic textiles in Medieval Europe: Trade, Circulation and Use. Islamic textiles were common in Medieval Europe. Imported by pilgrims returning from the Holy Land and traded across the Mediterranean, Islamic textiles became the staple of luxury furnishing and clothing. They adorned kings, saints, churches and palaces. Dr Gigante’s talk will address the presence and use and of such textiles, particularly in the 13th to 15th centuries, and explore their traces in fresco decorations, icon paintings, and decorative objects. Please click here to book.

Details:
Thursday 14 November, 18:00 – 19:45. The Pauling Centre, 58a Banbury Road, Oxford, OX2 6QS

 

Part of the exhibition at the Minneapolis Institute of Art

Another take on the trade in Islamic textiles comes from the exhibition currently taking place at the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Entitled Turkish Rugs on Tudor Walls: 16th-Century Trade between England and the Islamic World this exhibition examines the fundamental attraction and ambivalence between the English admiration of these sumptuous wares, and the idea of doing business with a people they deemed to be “heathen”.

Additional background to the exhibition is given in this post by the MIA. It points out that carpets were originally used as table covers and wall hangings – not floor coverings – and discusses the relationship between the Protestant Queen Elizabeth 1 and the Ottoman Empire.

Details:
Minneapolis Institute of Art, 2400 Third Avenue South, Minneapolis. Ends 7 June 2020.

 

The final item on this theme is the current exhibition at the British Museum on the subject Inspired by the East: How the Islamic World Influenced Western Art. For more details see my previous blog.

 

Man’s robe, Cameroon, mid-twentieth century. © Karun Thakar Collection

Also taking place in London but on a quite different topic is the exhibition at the Brunei Gallery, SOAS, of African Textiles from the Karun Thakar Collection. This exhibition is supported by Hali who state that the “high quality material on show highlights the sophistication of historical African textiles, which have been little understood and appreciated. The exhibition examines the links between West and North African textile traditions through a selection of important and rare examples of textile art, being shown here for the first time.” Having seen many photos of this exhibition it really does look like a must see! Karun will be leading two tours of the exhibition in November. The first will be this Saturday 2 November 13:00 – 15:00 and the second on Wednesday 27 November 13:00 – 14:00.

Details:
Brunei Gallery, SOAS University of London, 10 Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG. Ends 14 December.

Thangka painting of Padmasambhava, the ‘Lotus-Born’, who is one of the most popular teacher figures in Tibet. India 1788-1805. © British Library

The British Library in London currently have an exhibition on Buddhism. Visitors are invited to follow the life of the Buddha by examining sacred texts written on tree bark, palm leaves, gold plates and exquisite silk scrolls of major sutras. This blog by Jana Igunma, lead curator, gives a very good overview of the exhibition.

Details:
The British Library, 96 Euston Road. London, NW1 2DB. Ends 23 February 2020.

 

Detail of Mandala Chandar, Kashmir circa 1840.

From 31 October until 9 November Asian Art will be celebrated in London. “Asian Art in London, founded in 1998, is an annual event held over ten days in early November, which takes place within participating galleries and auction houses. It has a global reputation uniting leading Asian art dealers, auction houses, museums and societies in a series of gallery selling exhibitions, auctions, receptions and lectures. Together they celebrate the expertise and excellence of Asian art on view in London each November, with a wide range of Asian art from the antique to contemporary and in a price range designed to suit all pockets. Participant events are complemented by exhibitions and seminars at satellite events around London and at leading London academic institutions.” – Asian Art website.

According to Hali, textile lovers should head to Ryder Street to see Jacqueline Simcox’s exhibition which features a rare kesi panel and other Chinese silk textiles. Another highlight is the Kashmir shawl (shown above) which can be seen at Simon Ray’s gallery on King Street. Read this Hali article for more details.

 

A new book on Pakistani textiles has just been published. The Flowering Desert: Textiles of Sindh was written by Nasreen and Hasan Askari and celebrates these vibrant textiles through 150 colour illustrations. Nasreen mounted the first major exhibition of textiles from this area, Colours of the Indus, which was held at the V&A in 1997 and then moved to the National Museum of Scotland.

Blouse or tunic front, silk on cotton. © Hasan and Nasreen Askari

The Guardian has an excellent article on how Nasreen’s passion for these textiles developed, describing her 50 years of collecting and her understanding of the place of textiles in society – well worth a read!

 

Dayak beaded baby carrier © FCM/MUSEC

An exhibition celebrating the art of the Dayak is now on in Lugano, Switzerland. Dayak: the art of the headhunters of Borneo has been curated by Paolo Maiullari and is reputed to be one of the largest exhibitions in the world ever made on this subject and certainly the most extensive in the last few decades, filling 14 rooms of the museum.

Gavin Strachan has written a wonderful article for the forthcoming edition of Asian Textiles with his impressions of this exhibition and some great photos to whet your appetites. He highlights some fantastic woven mats and jackets decorated with cowries, beads and bronze pendants. Asian Textiles is produced three times per year and sent out to all members of the Oxford Asian Textile Group – a major incentive to join us!

Details:
Museum of Cultures, Villa Malpensata, Riva A. Caccia 5 / via G. Mazzini 5, 6900 Lugano. Closed Tuesdays. Ends 17 May 2020.

 

 

The 7th ASEAN Traditional Textile Symposium will be held in Yogyakarta, Java, next week and has lots of OATG involvement. One of the organisers, Mariah Waworuntu is a member, as are several speakers including Chris Buckley who will give one of the keynote lectures on the subject of Weaving in ASEAN: Shared Histories, Common Themes. The talks are grouped under the following themes: “Sustainable Traditional Textiles : Design & Fashion”, “Traditional Textile Innovations” , “Traditional Textile Preservations”, “Textiles in Past-and Present-day History”, “Traditional Textiles : Motifs and Meanings”, “Trans-national Textile Connections over the Course of Time”, “Traditional Textiles: Conservation, Looms and Fibers”,  and “Empowering Women through Weaving”. A full programme can be viewed here.

 

Finally OATG member Felicity Wood has kindly informed me of some Arts Society study days taking place at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford in January. These are open to the public as well as members of the Arts Society and are likely to be very popular, hence the advance notice. Subjects include The Visual Art of Power and Rank at the Chinese Imperial Court (David Rosier) and Japanese History, Art and Culture (Suzanne Perrin). Click here for full details.

 

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Event: Pop-Up Palaces – A journey through 1000 years of Egypt’s ceremonial tent-making tradition

 

Event date: Wednesday 14 November 2018, 18:30-20:30

In one of medieval Cairo’s last remaining covered streets is a community of tentmakers whose work has transformed the Egyptian landscape at times of celebration and festivity. For at least a millennium, these craftsmen have created magnificent handstitched cotton pavilions of a thousand colours which have entertained kings and country folk alike, awed enemies, and brought powerful sultans to tears.

Discover the stories of this fascinating craft through the voices of its craftsmen and patrons, past and present. Get to handle some of the treasures of this remarkable textile tradition, and immerse yourself in a little-known treasure-trove of Islamic art.

Seif El Rashidi is a historian of Islamic art who worked in historic Cairo for a decade, where he was first captivated by the tentmakers, and their splendid textile creations. This talk and textile handling session is the result of several years of research into the tent making tradition, leading to his newly published book The Tentmakers of Cairo: Egypt’s Medieval and Modern Applique Craft, (with Sam Bowker). 

For more details and booking click here

Location: Leighton House Museum, 12 Holland Park Rd, London, W14 8LZ