toward textile literacy

I know, it’s hard. It’s hard because we live in a world overcome by industry, which has taken many of us far away - the more industrialized, the further - from hands-on knowledge of how cloth and complex textiles are made. I don’t actually expect most people to understand terminology such as ‘warp-faced complementary warp pickup,’ or even ‘backstrap loom,’ but I still make note of it when showing my work, to specify the technique I used.

It’s similar to indicating whether a two-dimensional work on paper is a lithograph, an etching, a charcoal sketch, a monoprint, or a watercolor. These are all ways of making the thing, and it’s directly relevant to the artist and how they work. A watercolor painter won’t necessarily be able to create work using etching or printing techniques, and the work wouldn’t look the same if they did. The techniques are fundamentally different, and the art is expressed through the chosen medium, all of a piece.

mixed media, 2018 - sumi ink, acrylic, pastel and collage on paper

Likewise, when someone is a weaver, there’s a surprisingly wide range of techniques available, even if the medium is always tensioned yarn of some kind. The language available to us modern-day English speakers is limited and distorted by our lack of experience with making cloth. “Tapestry,” for example, is a mis-used word, perhaps most famously in reference to the Bayeux Tapestry, which is in fact an embroidered cloth. In common English usage, the word tapestry tends to refer to a textile that is hung on the wall, regardless of the technique used to make it.

plain weave strips of handspun cotton with wool stripes, being stitched together

Tapestry as a technique is exemplified by historical European wall coverings like the famous unicorn tapestries, by ‘flat-weave’ rugs such as Turkish kilim, and by artists such as Sarah Swett, Rebecca Mezoff, and Mary Zicafoose. Tapestry weaving is weft-faced, meaning the yarns you see are the weft yarns, covering the tensioned warp completely. Traditional Navajo rugs are also woven in this way, each row of weft yarn packed down tightly against the previous row, to form a smooth field of color. Contemporary artists of course muddy the waters for the layperson - for example Sarah Swett also indulges in backstrap-woven balanced plain weave, and Mary Zicafoose’s website offers hand-knotted carpets based on her tapestry weavings, produced in a workshop in Nepal. But the techniques are in every case noted alongside the textiles, so that you are never being misled by the artist. Textile artists tend to expend some effort (as I’m doing now) to explain how their work is made. This is not often expected of other artists, and I think we do it because our love makes us want to help people appreciate what’s going on with this stuff. That’s essentially the purpose of this website, to elucidate a few things about textiles.

more warp-faced complementary warp pickup, ‘loraypo’ pattern, using handspun wool

My work with the backstrap or body-tensioned loom - fundamentally some sticks and a belt around my body - tends toward the warp-faced, because this is what naturally happens when a warp is tensioned with the body: all the warp yarns crowd together closely. Traditional Andean designs take advantage of this, and use the warp yarns for patterning. Complementary warp pickup alternates warp yarn colors within a pair such that whatever is not up is down, and the pattern on the back of the weaving is the exact opposite of the front.

Bedouin style weaving in three panels, with supplementary warp patterning, made from handspun Navajo churro sheep’s wool

Another way to created warp-faced patterning is called supplementary warp, because an extra warp yarn is included, so that in each row you can choose which color to hold on top. The center pattern section of the weaving above, known as shajarah or sāhah in Arabia, has both dark and light warp yarns in each warp. The color that is not held to the front floats on the back.

weft float design based on Central Asian yurt band, using handspun wool

Okay one more, if you’re with me…. this is a warp float pattern commonly used among nomads of Central Asia and Iran. The warps are paired in two colors as with the Andean weaving, but in this case the pattern yarns are raised above everything, skipping or ‘floating’ over a row. The reverse side does not mirror the front in this case, but just looks like alternating stripes.

Bear in mind that each of these styles of patterning represents a different logic, a distinct way of thinking and of forming patterns. This effects what designs are possible within that logic, and it creates a kind of language and/or mathematics in the mind of the weavers who use these methods from a young age - their way of understanding is informed by their approach to weaving. This is where weaving becomes cosmic and mind-boggling for me.

plain weave black wool in progress

The other thing I do is plain weave. It has been a goal for some time to be able to weave balanced plain weave cloth, aka tabby, the basic over-under pattern that underlies what weaving fundamentally is, and create usable fabric, with my backstrap loom. I’ve written about this often, and have probably shared more images of work in progress than anyone needs to see, but there’s something enthralling about this view, the weaver’s perspective on the warp as it becomes cloth.

In order to really get warp and weft equally visible and ‘balanced’, I need to use a reed to hold the warp yarns in place. When I learned to make a bamboo reed from Bryan Whitehead in 2017 (two links because there were two posts about it,) this became a possibility for me, and I’ve been honing it ever since. Most of the cloth woven for my show earlier this year was plain weave, hung as ground behind lines of handspun yarn.

In hopes that this is more entertaining than pedantic, I’ve written this in order to elucidate some of the specifics of the weaver’s medium, and where my own work falls within the vast spectrum of weaving possibilities.

handwoven linen/cotton ground, handspun lambswool lines

the camel trapping on my wall

Looking at the camel trapping hanging on the wall, and remembering….

The first year we were married we lived in Greece, both of us teaching fellows at Athens College, a private school in a suburb of Athens. Our colleagues in the English department were Americans, Brits, Kiwis - some with Greek heritage or Greek spouses giving them an in with the language and culture. Most of them had been there a long time (we were young, so for anyone to do something for more than 10 years sounded like a long time.) There’s a type of person that falls in love with Greece - they go there and never return to their home country. Many are British, and I suspect the weather and the balmy sea and islands has something to do with it. This was our first experience with expats, people who choose to live away from their home culture. I think expats are always suspected of an aversion for their origins, and in some cases there’s definitely a sense of escape, but the more significant element, what makes it last, is love for the chosen home. People talk of birth families and chosen families, well there are also chosen homes. For us it was different - we kept moving, but chose the lifestyle of living and working abroad, continually learning new places, not alighting on a set home.

Sketchbook page - ink drawing of the view outside the window at our Athens College flat. Hills, trees, a house with curved tile roof.

But Greece was the beginning, the introduction to such possibilities, and it was fascinating to meet people who had been immersed for so long that their habits and communication style were Greek. I remember learning the yes and no head gestures, subtle and nearly opposite to ours, from a British man, who was doing it so subconsciously he didn’t realize they needed explaining.

Greece was also our entry point to Asia, which I only truly understand in retrospect. But even while there, the notion of Asia Minor, of this culture that was leaning toward Asian rather than European sensibilities, was palpable. It was in the iconography and the devotion of the churches, the narrow and piled-up layout of villages, the widows everywhere in black dresses. It felt European and Asian-leaning, both at once, as with one foot in each type of society.

Sketchbook page - ink drawings of geometric designs from the peristeriones, the dovecotes of the Greek islands. Profile of a small island at bottom.

This made is easy to grasp that Istanbul was the real gateway to Asia, the Bosphorus Strait a crossing. And of course the mosques, the markets, the handwoven carpets and women in headscarves pulled our minds that much further into the unfamiliar, a reality tinged with unknowables and enticing details - like the sage tea served in small tulip-shaped glasses, the flatbread ovens working all day long to produce warm stacks collected by boys … the swirl and the busy street life told me I was in Asia. The profusion of scents and patterns, the togetherness of people. Some of this is only known by looking back, but since our own path went progressively into Asia and remained there at length, I can see what drew me in and eventually became familiar.

Sketchbook page - pencil drawing of “Ali Pasha’s, Istanbul”, a rug seller’s booth bedecked with textiles.

We only had tourist visas, we teaching fellows of Athens College, so we left the country every 3 months. Twice to Turkey, once to Egypt, and it was on one of the Istanbul visits that I purchased tribal patchwork textiles in the market. Everyone was trying to get foreigners to buy rugs. Traveling with two other teaching fellows, we were invited into rug-laden dens, given tea, and treated to an endless display of kilim, which none of us wanted. We were too young to have houses that needed rugs, and were living in borrowed rooms for less than a year. So we enjoyed the show but staved off the selling. The patchwork that I thought of as Uzbek, however, I spotted on my own as we wandered through a narrow set of street stalls. As a quilter, I took a special interest in patchwork, and I already owned a few Uzbek pieces, from my time at an import store, so I knew what I was looking at.

Small patchwork hanging bought in Istanbul, with rope snake and lattice of squares joined on point. Silk, velvet, and cotton fabrics in rich jewel tones, lots of red. Presumably the snake is protective. From what I understand, the patchwork and high contrast colors confuse and repel evil spirits. These hangings are used over doors and windows and along the interior walls of the yurt.

The two from Istanbul were unusual - one with a snake made from black and white rope, stitched onto a red velvet ground, and the other a wide, meandering piece that unfolded into arms with fabric tassels on the end and took all four of us to hold it open as the vendor said, “Camel trapping.” I believed him because the head piece was clearly visible in the shape of this thing, but for years I never knew what it really meant. I just knew that someone had edged each square with narrow binding, had embellished with white lines by sewing machine and by hand, had embroidered and appliquéd and sewn on buttons and coins and tassels made from shreds of fabric. The amount of work and care given to this thing, and its extraordinary structure of black and red arms with rows of squares joined on point in between, spoke the importance of this piece, even if I had no idea who made it or why, exactly. The vendor may have said Turkmen - I called all such things Uzbek, but suffice to say it came from Central Asia and was tribal. Who ever knows where nomadic people are at any given moment?

Close up of head piece of camel trapping - rounded flap, edged with red, decorated with black and white braid, appliquéd red and white zig zag, coins and buttons. Machine and hand embroidery in different areas.

Detail of fabric tassels.

Detail of white square with black and red felt appliqué triangles. Susan Meller calls patches with this kind of embellishment ‘talismanic.’

And this is what it tells me about now - now that I’ve read about the use of these textiles to adorn the lead camel in a Turkmen bridal procession. It tells me of nomadic pastoralism, of people who know their way through a certain land, who move with the weather and the seasons and the needs of their animals, whose life rituals are molded from this reliance on mobility and known but unowned land. No need to use cliché phrases here, we know the fate of such lifestyles, and of the concept of “unowned land”. And the camel trapping’s availability in the market tells me about that, the eventual expiration of the need for camel-led bridal processions. Not much to say… it was an important thing, and now it’s not. But to me it’s important to know, to see the effort that people put into textiles that were emblematic of a way of life. They are a form of memory, and a message that value systems shift and change, that what one set of people considers impressive, significant, indicative of wealth and status, will be utterly missed by another set of people who value different signs and symbols.

Camel trapping from Susan Meller’s book Silk and Cotton: Textiles from the Central Asia that was. This image, first seen in an ARAMCO calendar, confirmed that my piece is a camel trapping - there are many striking similarities of design and embellishment technique.

Detail of my camel trapping, showing embroidery, black and white braid, buttons, zig zag appliqué.

Detail of my camel trapping. I photographed it at night in bright light, because it’s not very well lighted during the day. Shadows are a little harsh.

Humans converge on objects of importance across cultures at different times, and for centuries those objects were textile-based. Certain dyestuffs, the method of silk cultivation, how to mechanically spin cotton into thread - these things ruled trade and power at moments in history. But converging on one set of values does not do humans any good when those values drag us away from the realms we have learned and known as a people. This artificial imposition of value is wearing itself out, wearing us out. Somehow the Turkmen camel trapping tells me all of this.

Another camel trapping image, from Janet Harvey’s Traditional Textiles of Central Asia. This one, again with many similarities to both of my pieces, has an emphasis on red, squares joined on point, tassels and high contrast embroidery. It also has child’s hair sewn onto the main red rectangle, as noted in Harvey’s caption.

to the author of Fewer, Better Things

 I wanted to like this book. I saved the review from the paper, my interest piqued. I was counseled to read the book by The Craftsmanship Initiative, whose quarterly newsletter is full of good things. Focusing on craft skill is right up my alley, the banner under which I march, and so forth. But Glenn Adamson, you lost me at page forty, when you took the same old, well-worn trail of Western hegemonic educators everywhere and implied that backstrap weaving was some antiquated form, estimable but sadly handicapped by its too-human parameters.

This surprised me, given that I'd been reading about the value of ‘material intelligence’, the interactive relationship between person and materials as a two-way street of skills acquisition, the emphasis on using our bodies the way they were meant to be used in learning to work and make within this world. So many good moments and thoughts! But when you reached weaving, you dropped the ball. Let me explain. Here's the excerpt:          

"The most ancient forms of weaving had been done on standing frames or so-called 'backstrap looms,' in which the warp threads were anchored by the weaver's body. As she leaned back, the threads were put under tension.... This system can be used to make beautiful, though narrow, textiles -- only as wide as the weaver's body. The complexity is limited to what the weaver can accomplish by hand, picking up threads one or a few at a time, and also limited to what the weaver can either plan and remember, or improvise.

            By contrast, the industrial looms that preceded Jacquard's innovations were able to 'remember' twenty-four or so different patterns, any of which could be applied to a given pick. This permitted great variation but nothing compared to what Jacquard achieved."

-    Fewer, Better Things, p. 40

Past tense?

            By relegating backstrap weaving to the past, the author willfully ignores the bulk of handweaving expertise in the world today. By "bulk" I mean the sheer number of people who know how to do this thing, and are likely to practice it at some point in their lives, and/or to make use of the products of this weaving technique. And by "handweaving expertise" I mean the skill and knowledge that working with such a method requires, which is greater than that required for operating mechanized looms. Numerous and significant cultures maintain living, continuous backstrap weaving practices that have not been replaced by mechanization. Anyone who lives in or travels to Southeast Asia or South America (very broadly speaking - I could get more precise, and I have,) or even sees the photos of travelers, will likely encounter some manifestation of backstrap weaving. Certainly in many places the skills or prevalence of backstrap weaving is much reduced from past glory, but this is not because looms were invented that replicated the intricacy and complexity of the woven work. It is because the availability of cheaper cloth led to a devaluation of the handwoven, labor-intensive fabrics, and cultures have subsequently lost the ability to sustain the practice in the context of a global market economy.

Centro des Textiles Tradicionales del Cusco, Peru (Not my image) http://www.textilescusco.org/index.php/weaving-demonstrations/

Historical relevance

             In a Euro-centric narrative of weaving (which, if you’re building up to Jacquard, it is), tracing the origins to backstrap is erroneous, given that there is no evidence for this technique in Europe. Perhaps the term "standing frames" refers to warp-weighted looms, but the author skips over any elucidation of the term, in his eagerness to explain the limitations of backstrap weaving. Warp-weighted looms are in archaeological evidence throughout Europe[i], and can be more accurately considered as a practice of the past[ii], since this technology and its use in creating large-scale commercial cloth was replaced with increasingly mechanized looms. Current practice of warp-weighted weaving is more in the vein of revival, research, and historical re-enactment. Weavers using this practice as a tradition were "found" in the 1950's,[iii] but that very expression indicates that current practice is nowhere near the scale of backstrap weaving.

            Someone may be tempted to argue that it's difficult to find archaeological evidence of backstrap weaving, since the materials tend to be wood and thus decompose, so there is no way to know where such weaving was done in the past. But there is in fact evidence of backstrap loom use, such as bronze grave goods in southern China from the first millenium BCE, which are notably exactly the same as the loom parts currently in use in southern Laos and Hainan Island.[iv] In addition, research of archaeological textile fragments can reveal the type of loom used to create them[v], and extensive studies have been done on textiles found in Europe, none of which mention backstrap weaving as a technique.[vi]

My friend Keo, a Katu weaver from Salavan province, weaves on a loom with parts just like the ones excavated in Shizhaishan, China. My photo from 2013, Ock Pop Tok Living Crafts Center, Luang Prabang, Laos

Let’s talk limitations

With regard to the potential width of backstrap woven textiles, I would like to submit a simple fact and a few photos. At 18 inches wide, my hips are bigger than most of the traditional backstrap weavers I’ve known, and at the moment I have a 20 inch wide warp on the loom. It has taken me eight years to weave that wide, but that is a measure of my skills acquisition, not my body size. Weaving wide, as well as weaving long, or weaving complex patterns, or simply weaving at all on a backstrap loom requires an extensive skill set that is quite different from that of any type of weaving with a mechanized loom. The bodily control of tension, and the physical interaction with the warp yarns, differentiates this method in such a way that if Adamson had delved rather than dismissing it, he would have found a wealth of information to illustrate the very concepts in his book.

The photos below, which I collected online and did not take myself, should effectively disprove the notion of backstrap weaving being “as wide as the weaver’s body.” There are body-related limitations, of course: one has to be able to reach the edges, manipulate the heddles and sword beater, and maintain proper tension. But as these weavers show, with advanced skill the width of the fabric can be impressive.

Amuzgo weaver, Oaxaca, Mexico. Not my image http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Amuzgo_textiles

Don Evaristo Borboa, master rebozo weaver of Mexico. http://oaxacaculture.com/2017/02/rebozo-weaving-technology-in-mexico-how-to-make-an-ikat-shawl/

Katu weaver in Salavan province, Laos. Foot-tensioned loom like Keo’s above. Image from Above the Fray: https://hilltribeart.com/loom-weaving-techniques

Image by Paul Arps. Ikat weaving in Bena indigenous Ngada village (Flores, Indonesia 2016)

https://www.flickr.com/photos/slapers/30039197170

Moving on, we come to the limitation of what the weaver can "remember or improvise," which is contrasted with an impressive twenty-four or more patterns, beyond which the Jacquard loom enables the pattern to change with every pick (that is, every row.) Okay. First of all, how do we know how many patterns a lifelong weaver, in a continuous, centuries-old tradition, can remember or improvise? How do you even quantify patterns? If I agreed that they could be counted, I'd say twenty-four is a pittance compared to what the average Peruvian weaver carries in her mind and hands. If you're factoring in improvisation (which I would argue is always in play,) it becomes impossible to actually count patterns, because they shift incrementally, repeating and mirroring and flipping in various directions. [vii]

Secondly, what makes you think that backstrap weavers can't change patterns with every pick? Let us be clear: backstrap weavers can do anything they want, as long as they level up to the necessary skills. They can pick up every row by hand, they can install pattern heddles, and they can add supplementary threads as they go. The designs and patterning evolve within the weaving tradition, in accordance with the prevalent techniques, so there are things certain weavers tend to do or not do, based on the logic of their technical methods. But they can change patterns as much as they like, including ways that are impossible on a mechanized loom, such as the scaffold weaving, or discontinuous warps, of Pitumarca. Take a moment to contemplate the detail below, woven as a single piece on a backstrap loom.

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Contemporary scaffold weave with pickup designs from Pitumarca, Peru. The different colors of warp in each stripe are interlaced on the loom, and the designs are picked up by hand in each row. (My photo, textile from private collection)

The statement contrasting the Jacquard achievements with the limitations of handweavers seems to fall into a post-industrial trap: that of equating the most complex with the pinnacle of achievement. Changing every color in every warp in every pick may maximize variability of design, but that’s not the same as achieving the peak of expressive and technical capability within the medium. Again, a strange angle to encounter in a book extolling craft skill.

©Wendy Garrity 2018. Detail of contemporary kushutara weaving from Bhutan. Supplementary weft technique, woven on a backstrap loom.

Why get into it?

I'm addressing this because I come up against it repeatedly, in the world of museums and scholarly research into art, archaeology, technical skill, anthropology, etc. It seems that scholars using the example of weaving to support their argument believe that no one else could possibly know more than they do about the niche they are exploring, so if they can give the most rudimentary explanation of how a backstrap loom is operated, then they can speak with authority about the status of the craft historically. Or something. I mean, why else would you write a paragraph like that?

There's a built-in presumption that no one is going to call you out on the accuracy of your representation, and the only reason for this would be that it's not important enough for other scholars to care. And certainly no one at the level of your readers will know about backstrap weaving, because after all it's an obsolete practice. Which means the starting point is disdain for the position this craft skill holds in the world. Think about that. Like some 19th century anthropological diorama, backstrap weaving is only ever invoked to demonstrate why it fell by the wayside. Never mind that it hasn’t.

As a backstrap weaver with mentors all over the world, it gets under my skin. I've sat through graduate-level lectures where professors told me the history of spinning and weaving, always in the service of some other, grander purpose (such as museum studies or archaeology), usually riddled with errors, and never, ever conscious of the scope of traditional weaving going on in the world today. I have tried to address this omission in my master’s thesis, Encountering Woven Knowledge, and in essays such as Does the Ethnographic Textile Exist?

Perhaps the most maddening aspect is that pre-industrial textile methods can brilliantly illustrate most arguments that progressive academics might wish to make, if only they would look deeply and give it a chance. Communities of practice, body and mind integration, craft informing all realms of a culture, the intelligence embodied in making - these are important topics that need to be highlighted and written about, and which are amply illustrated by the ongoing, inimitable work of backstrap weaving in the world today.

I’m reading through to the end of the book, because I do believe in the overall agenda of promoting ‘material intelligence,’ living in touch with things, and generally paying attention. I refer you back to my favorite words on craft ever.

[i]  Barber EW. 1991 Prehistoric Textiles: The Development of Cloth in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, with Special Reference to the Aegean, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. pp. 91-113

[ii] Susan T. Edmunds, Picturing Homeric Weaving, Center for Hellenic Studies, Harvard University:

https://chs.harvard.edu/CHS/article/display/4365#noteref_n.45

[iii] What is a Warp-Weighted Loom? Textile Research Centre, Leiden:

https://trc-leiden.nl/trc-digital-exhibition/index.php/ancient-greek-loom-weights/item/132-4-what-is-a-warp-weighted-loom

 Hoffman, M. 1964. The Warp-Weighted Loom: Studies in the History and Technology of an Ancient Implement. Oslo (Reprinted, 1974, in the United States by Robin and Russ Handweavers). 

[iv] Vollmer JE. 1977 Archaeological and Ethnological Considerations of the Foot-Braced Body-Tension Loom. In: Gervers V (ed) Studies in Textile History. Toronto: Royal Ontario Museum, 343-354.

Barber, 1991, p.81

UNESCO video: Traditional Li Textile Techniques https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QI96KUULaBY

[v] Barber EW. 1991 Prehistoric Textiles: The Development of Cloth in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, with Special Reference to the Aegean, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. pp. 143-144

[vi] Grömer, K. 2016 The Art of Prehistoric Textile Making: the development of craft traditions and clothing in Central Europe, Vienna: Natural History Museum Vienna.

[vii] Franquemont EM. 2004 Jazz, an Andean Sense of Symmetry. In: Washburn DK (ed) Embedded Symmetries, Natural and Cultural. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press, 81-94.

collection of Leslie Grace, among other things

One of the great things about being with Laverne for a few days was that we got to talk about weaving, ALL the TIME. We hardly stopped looking at textiles and discussing them - textiles we make, textiles we own or get to visit and touch, and those we only see in video. The conversation was constant and wide-ranging, as endless as our fascination for how woven things are made.  I pulled out so many things to show her that I kept seeing enticing new arrangements and juxtapositions among my own collection, as above. The textiles always want to converse with each other, too.

Luckily, a beautiful exhibition of pieces from the collection of Leslie Grace was still up at the Aljoya Thornton Place. This is where Leslie lives, and they hung gems from her collection throughout the lobby and hallways very nicely, with variable amounts of information. I don't know where to start or how to order things, so I will just follow our trail through the exhibit, more or less. Each piece was exquisite quality, drawing me in with its fine detail and workmanship. Some were familiar techniques and traditions, others completely unknown to me, like the North African headscarf resist-dyed with indigo and intricately embroidered. It is woven from handspun wool. How I would love to see the weaving method for this!

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Tunisian wool resist-dyed head cloth, with embroidery.

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Tunisian head cloth, detail

The image reminded my husband of Zanskari lingste, the dyed handwoven capes I collected in Ladakh, and there is a distinct resemblance.

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From my collection, handwoven wool lingtse, or cape, from Zanskar, India

This bow-loom-like triangular loom, made from a single bent stick, was familiar to Laverne, because she had seen a similar piece in another collection (Ravelry link). The looms are used to weave plant fiber into wristlets that have something to do with archery (the information is thin on the ground in these collections.) The patterning sticks control which warp threads will be raised in each pick, and the weft is carried on a tiny shuttle. The weaving is a bit more than two inches wide. When finished, the fringe passes through the loops at the beginning, making an adjustable cuff.

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Triangular frame loom  - Mayoruna people of lowland Peru

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Finished cuff with fringe threaded through loops.

Another lowland Peru group (name and place unknown) was represented in the collection by beautiful, naturally colored cotton warp-faced plainweave with striped patterns. A photo showed them wearing long tunics, and on display were a bag and a flat cloth with incised bone decoration. We were both enthralled by the simple beauty of the stripes.

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Detail of bone tassels and bag strap, handwoven cotton.

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Bag detail, showing a cross knit looping edging around the top. Naturally colored cotton.

Below is another warp-faced plainweave garment, a tube skirt from Burma (Myanmar), embellished with supplementary weft patterning. I'd seen examples of this when I worked at an import store years ago.

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Burmese sarong, handwoven cotton.

Our favorite display was the one used in the promotional photos for this exhibition: a sarong and jacket from Sumatra. It's also warp-faced, surely backstrap woven, and embroidered with extreme intricacy. The mirrors in the blue field are less than 1/4" across. The color combination is stunning, indigo against a deep, glowing gold.

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It was striking to me how many of these pieces, from all over the world, were warp-faced backstrap weavings. Laverne and I could look at them and envision creating that structure ourselves, because it's the way we weave. I may not achieve the refinement of skill necessary in this lifetime, but I can relate to the weavings, and see how they've been made. These are all extreme detail shots, and I apologize for not showing the entire piece, but in this way you are looking the way we looked, as closely as possible.

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Jacket detail, handwoven and embroidered in Sumatra, late 19th/early 20th century.

Finally, an extremely fine sarong from the Li people of Hainan Province, China, which is way out of my league for many lives to come. And yet, I'm familiar with the weaving technique. The Li weavers use foot-tensioned backstrap looms, similar to the Katu weavers in Laos. So we know this is also backstrap-woven, and it's made up of several narrow strips, less than 10" wide. The intricacy of the ikat and supplementary warp patterning is mind-boggling. A shot of the whole thing would have erased the detail, since this piece was not well lighted, so I took photos along the more visible edge. The colors are subtle, probably natural dye and probably faded. It's a wonderful work, as are all of the items in this collection. I'm so happy I got to see it, especially with a fellow weaver.

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Detail of ikat panel, handwoven sarong from Li people of Hainan, China

Going around with Laverne was fun because neither of us had to explain the basics in order to convey our awe and admiration, as we might have with lay people who don't weave. We could simply say, "Wow, look at that ikat! Look at that twining!" etc. There was plenty to discuss, but we could start at a point of shared knowledge, and we both reveled in the presence of truly great textile work.

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Another detail of the sarong, Hainan, China

defining textiles

The chart documents a discussion I had with Dinah Eastop, textile conservator and visiting lecturer at UCL in Qatar. It was just the two of us, and she had brought a collection of objects, small enough to fit in her suitcase, demonstrating a wide variety of things that could be considered textiles, or not: a cotton bag, a knitted sock, a rubber glove, a flat loofah with twill tape edging, cotton balls, birch bark, papyrus sheets, decorative beaded medallions, hotel slippers, a plastic scrubbie, etc. 

My job was to sort them into what I considered textiles and not-textiles. I ended up making a spectrum, with the most obvious textile pieces at one end, progressing through the anomalous and questionable to those that I would not characterize as textiles at all. 

The exercise was interesting, and the discussion even more so, because it forced me to articulate what my criteria are for designating a thing as "textile." Despite years of studying, making and collecting textiles, I'd never really thought concretely about how to define them or characterize them. I knew there were issues with perception and nomenclature, because when I tell people I work with or study textiles, it's often not readily apparent what I mean. The most striking example of this was when I said I studied (traditional, handmade) textile production - I must have said "traditional" and/or "handmade", but I don't remember - and a woman looked at me and said, "You mean, like child labor?" Um..., no.

I realized then that it's the kind of subject that has so many associations that each person will simply attach to whatever is closest to their interests, if they have any associated interest at all. For most people, this means clothing or fashion, in some cases the "textile industry," which encompasses everything from rugs to upholstery to industrial products. There are times when I've felt tired of the word myself, because of its lack of specific, comprehensible meaning. My interest in the subject always has to be explained, defined, and clarified - what kind of textiles am I talking about when I say textiles? In my mind, it's very specific, but the word has such a vast and varied life that it doesn't suffice by itself.

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These are definitely textiles. Suzani embroidery, left, and Palestinian cross-stitch pillows and bodice pieces, in Amman, Jordan.

So although I've grown accustomed to defining the type of textile I'm most interested in, and indeed spent chunks of my master's thesis doing just that, I had never been faced with the practical question of "What is a textile?" Dinah's exercise is brilliant for this, and I enjoyed sorting the objects immensely. Even before I was finished, I found myself raising questions, wanting to discuss particularities - but she wanted me to set them out in my categories, and then we began to discuss.

The chart shows how we ended up explaining my characterizations. What emerged was my emphasis on materials and construction. Most obviously, anything with a woven or knitted construction was a textile, and then anything incorporating some element with that construction, such as the loofah with twill tape edging and cloth backing. Then there were questions of flexibility - for example, plant fibers can be made into cloth, but if the plant matter is sufficiently stiff, it moves into basketry, which I distinguish from "textile," although the techniques are still a type of weaving. Simply examining how my own mind responded to each of these considerations, with Dinah mirroring and responding to my comments, led me to understand the complexity of the various factors and the elusiveness of this term in more depth. Exciting stuff, for a textile maker and scholar, let me tell you.

We ended up with certain materials that were stumpers, such as leather. Dinah mentioned that when she has done this exercise with other groups, quite often people will put anything that is worn in the textile category, because clothing = textiles in their mind, whether it's a leather sandal or a rubber glove. In this case, the emphasis is on function, rather than material or construction techniques. There are plenty of examples of historical clothing, from ancient Chinese armor to Lizzy Gardiner's American Express card dress which would challenge the question of what makes a textile. 

And then there's paper, and papyrus, which is similar to barkcloth in terms of production techniques, and modern paper was originally made from cloth waste, after all.... so there is a continuum, and an overlapping of materials and methods that can make something more or less textile-like. I think of clothing made from Tyvek, and how the fabric of this bonded polyethelene product behaves much like cloth.

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Fijian ceremonial dress made of Masa (barkcloth), UBC Museum of Anthropology.

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Hawaiian dancers use Pellon® non-woven interfacing to imitate the barkcloth that would have been worn in the past.

There was another continuum in my arrangement of the objects, and that was from raw material to manufactured piece. A cotton ball, for instance, is not something I call a textile, although the material can be turned into one. Even spools of thread were not included in my textile category, because by themselves, they are raw materials. This may beg the question of how I would define my own handspun yarn, but I still think I would not call it a textile, even if I consider some skeins as finished objects.

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One of my favorite "objects" in the textile storage rooms at the UBC Museum of Anthropology. I believe it's from Indonesia, naturally dyed plant fiber.

balls of yarn

I saw some, at my friend's house, in a bowl of decorative, round objects, and I recognized them immediately as handspun yarns from the souk.

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Handspun yarn in a basket in Souq Waqif, Doha, Qatar

Except they weren't. They are Tibetan, she told me, and she bought them in Nepal.  I was amazed by the similarity: the general gauge, or thickness of the yarn, the variation, the high twist, indicating that it's meant for rugged materials, were all the same. This set my mind working on the shared culture of nomads, but my thoughts were interrupted when my friend said that well, the yarns in the souk were probably imported or made by Nepalis anyway.

Suddenly I found myself vouching for the authenticity of the souk yarns, having seen the spindles and the spinning of wool myself. I was surprisingly invested in convincing her that this was real, handspun yarn and the women I met in the souk are real Bedouins - primarily because it is the truth, and when it comes to textile making I'm always concerned that people know the facts.

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Handspun yarn, spun and dyed in Doha, hanging to dry at Souq Waqif.

The conversation that followed made me wonder about the desire for authenticity in a place or an experience, and the degree to which one's own preconceptions shape what one will accept as authentic. Of course this authenticity discussion is a huge, amorphous topic that has no edges nor hope of resolution.

What I wanted to keep thinking about, though, is the role that textile making plays as a marker of authenticity.... When I went looking for Bedouin weavers in Qatar, I was not in search of authenticity - just weaving. People making things. Yes, I hoped to find people that were weaving in a way that was typical in times past, a technique with some historical continuity. Having found that, and the production of yarn that goes with it, I guess my point is that I didn't need to raise the issue or mention the word authenticity. Work was being done with fiber, and I began taking note of how it was done. The work I witnessed correlates with other forms of Bedouin spinning and weaving as documented throughout the Arab world, and so I consider it traditional Bedouin textile production. But the most important point is that people are spinning and weaving.

So what is it that is so fundamental in this process, that erases doubt? How does textile making embody cultural preservation? It seems to me that it essentially does, and in different ways depending on the culture under discussion, but this knowledge of how to make is the essence. Especially when it enables people to make clothing and shelter, two of the main requisites and defining aspects of any people. Perhaps it comes down to this: knowing how to provide for a family or community through spinning and weaving is proof of culture bearing.

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Bedouin weaving WIP: this was my learning piece, so it's not very good. The gazelle horn belongs to my teacher, and her grandmother before her.