Striking 19th-Century Ikat Fabrics Unveiled in Upcoming Textile Museum Exhibition

07/13/2010 — tmpressroom

The luscious colors and bold patterns of ikat, a textile woven from pre-dyed thread, have earned these fabrics international recognition as the latest trend in fashion and interior design. Visitors to Colors of the Oasis: Central Asian Ikats, opening at The Textile Museum on October 16, 2010, will discover why the craft of ikat has been considered a cultural treasure in Uzbekistan for over two centuries.  The exhibition will showcase a selection of 19th-century ikat garments and textiles from the Museum’s Megalli Collection in engaging, off-the-wall installations that situate ikat production, use and aesthetic significance to Central Asian culture within a socio-historic context.  The exhibition also heralds the recent revival of this art form in Uzbekistan after near extinction during the Soviet era, coinciding with the global popularity of this aesthetic through popular design houses such as Oscar de la Renta, J. Crew, and Pottery Barn.  The more than 60 garments and other textiles in the exhibition have never been exhibited before.  The exhibition will be accompanied by a full-color comprehensive book, published by The Textile Museum, which will present new scholarship and illustrate the collection in its entirety.

Ikat robe
Robe
Central Asia, Uzbekistan, Bukhara
1870s-1880s
The Textile Museum 2005.36.30
The Megalli Collection

About the Exhibition

Unlike a majority of textiles that are woven with solid-colored thread or are printed or dyed after weaving, ikat is produced using the reverse process.  Individual threads are first dyed with several colors that, when woven together, produce the energetic patterns unique to this textile tradition.  Successful application of this complex technique requires extensive forethought and teamwork between various craftsmen and the designer.  For this reason, ikat has been celebrated in Central Asia as one of the region’s great arts.  In the 19th century, when costume indicated an individual’s social rank, wealth, domestic role, tribal affiliation and geographic origin, ikat was considered the most prestigious material to wear.  Alarmingly, however, this art form was nearly lost during the Soviet era.

Oscar De La Renta Spring 2005

Oscar De La Renta Spring 2005. Photographer Fernanda Calfat. 51299358 (RM) Getty Images.

Fortunately, 19 years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Uzbekistan’s ikat industry is currently under renewal by artists using the traditional technique.  Ikat continues to gain international recognition with recent trends in fashion and home décor motivated by designers who are inspired by the textile’s bold motifs.

Robe, Central Asia, Uzbekistan, Bukhara, Late 19th to early 20th century, The Textile Museum 2005.36.31, The Megalli Collection

With an appreciation for the textile’s increasing global popularity, Colors of the Oasis will trace the historic development of ikat production and its contemporary revival.  The pieces featured in the exhibition were selected from The Textile Museum’s Megalli collection, a diverse array of 19th-century ikat robes, pants, dresses, bohce (wrapping cloth), hangings, fragments and cradle covers donated to the institution by collector Murad Megalli in 2005 and 2009.  The exhibition is divided into three sections that guide the visitor through ikat design and artistic principles, the stories of the people who used them and how, and the technical aspect of ikat making and the people involved in this craft.  Innovative off-the-wall installations, including a setting inspired by a 19th-century Uzbek interior, life-like displays using dress forms and historic photographs, situate the collection within a socio-historic context and encourage the visitor to appreciate the textile’s versatility and significance to Central Asian culture.  Models demonstrating the dyeing process constructed by MICA (Maryland Institute College of Art) students provide insight into how these fabrics are made.  Colors of the Oasis: Central Asian Ikats is curated by Sumru Belger Krody, Curator of Eastern Hemisphere Collections at The Textile Museum.

The accompanying book, Colors of the Oasis: Central Asian Ikats, will be the first significant publication on Central Asian ikats produced in the U.S. in over a decade.  The book, edited by Krody, will introduce the latest research on ikat aesthetics and costume history with a concise narrative of ikat production in Central Asia by contributing authors Feza Çakmut, Mary M. Dusenbury, Kate Fitz Gibbon, Andrew Hale, Sumru Belger Krody, Sayera Makhkamova and Susan Meller.  The book is beautifully illustrated with high quality images and historic prints, including a detailed catalog of the entire 160-piece Megalli Collection.

Related Programs

The Textile Museum plans to inaugurate Colors of the Oasis with a weekend symposium, Tying the Rainbow: Reexamining Central Asian Ikats from Friday, October 15 – Sunday, October 17.  The distinct collection will be unveiled with an evening reception for Textile Museum members on October 15.  A day-long lecture series on October 16 will include presentations on ikat’s production history, socio-cultural importance in Central Asia and the textile’s influence on contemporary global fashion.  Speakers will include Dr. Anne Bissonnette, Associate Professor and Curator of the Clothing and Textiles Collection at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada; Mary M. Dusenbury, Research Curator at the Spencer Museum of Art, Lawrence, Kansas; Andrew Hale, scholar and Colors of the Oasis catalog contributor, Santa Fe, New Mexico; Dr. Jeff Sahadeo, Director of the Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada; Dr. Elena Tsareva, Head of Textile Research at the Kunstkamera Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia; and Philippa Watkins, Senior Tutor in Constructed Textiles at the Royal College of Art, London, UK.  The symposium will conclude on October 17 with a curator’s tour of the exhibition and a show-and-tell of Central Asian ikats from registrants’ collections.  For more details or to register, visit www.textilemuseum.org/symposium.htm or call (202) 667-0441, ext. 64.

While Colors of the Oasis is on view, The Textile Museum will also host a number of exhibition-related events, including demonstrations, interactive family programs, performances, gallery talks, lectures and the popular after-hours “PM @ The TM” series.  For updates or more information on Textile Museum programs, visit www.textilemuseum.org or call (202) 667-0441.  

About the Curator

Sumru Belger Krody, curator of Eastern Hemisphere Collections at The Textile Museum, is considered the leading authority on Ottoman Turkish and Greek embroidery.  She has been with The Textile Museum for over 15 years and has served as head of the Eastern Hemisphere curatorial department since 2001.  Krody’s previous exhibitions include Flowers of Silk & Gold: Four Centuries of Ottoman Embroidery (2004-5); Floral Perspectives in Carpet Design (2006); Harpies, Mermaids and Tulips: Embroidery of the Greek Islands and Epirus Region (2006); and Ahead of His Time: The Collecting Vision of George Hewitt Myers (2007-8).  Krody has previously authored two exhibition catalogs, Harpies, Mermaids, and Tulips (2006) and Flowers of Silk and Gold: Four Centuries of Ottoman Embroidery (2000).  Krody also serves on the board of the Textile Society of America.

To request images for press use, click here.

To download the press release in PDF format, click here.

To download a complete press kit, click here.

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The Textile Museum to Kick Off Summer with Annual Two-Day Festival

05/12/2010 — tmpressroom

Celebration of TextilesThe Textile Museum will hold its 32nd annual Celebration of Textiles on Saturday, June 5, 10 a.m.–4 p.m. and Sunday, June 6, 1-5 p.m. This free festival for all ages, held rain or shine, invites visitors to explore the textile arts and cultures of the world through hands-on activities and artist demonstrations in the museum’s gardens, historic buildings and current exhibitions.

Program highlights for this year’s Celebration of Textiles festival include:

  • Live musical performances by acoustic roots duo Herb & Hanson (Sat., 2-4 p.m. and Sunday, 3-5 p.m.) who have performed at the Kennedy Center and Strathmore Hall, among other Mid-Atlantic venues
  • Hands-on activities, including block printing and bracelet making
  • Spinning, weaving, knitting, embroidery and indigo dyeing demonstrations
  • Delicious Indian food from Fojol Bros. of Merlindia (available for purchase)
  • Drawings for gift certificates to Teaism, Restaurant Nora, Kramerbooks and other Dupont Circle area businesses
  • Live sheep-shearing demonstrations

Please note: Activities and demonstrations vary on Saturday and Sunday. For full program details, visit www.textilemuseum.org. ALL ACTIVITIES ARE FREE.

Celebrating Local Students’ Art

On Saturday from 12:30-1 p.m. a ceremony will be held recognizing the students participating in this year’s Museum-School Partnership: a 1st grade class from Lafayette Elementary School; a 3rd grade class from Horace Mann Elementary School; and a 3rd-5th mixed grade level class from Matthew G. Emery Educational Center. Through this annual program, the museum educates Washington, D.C. students about textiles and the cultures that produce them, and works with students in the creation and display of their own textile artwork. Their creations will be unveiled on June 5 and will remain on view at The Textile Museum through the month.

Current Exhibitions

Visitors can explore the colorful and whimsical textile designs of three groundbreaking women in the exhibit Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain, on view May 15-September 12, 2010. Also on view is the complementary exhibit The Art of Living: Textile Furnishings from the Permanent Collection, featuring furnishing fabrics from cultures around the world.

History of Celebration of Textiles

The Celebration of Textiles festival started with the goal of inviting people to come in casually and learn about the techniques and cultures represented in the museum’s exhibitions, drawing in new audiences and offering an opportunity for people of all ages to explore the wonder and variety of textile art. While The Textile Museum now provides a variety of opportunities for children to learn about textiles year-round through school programs and the hands-on Activity Gallery of The Textile Learning Center, the spirit of Celebration of Textiles has remained constant. It aims to build a greater appreciation of the textile arts through intergenerational activities that can be enjoyed by children, parents, grandparents and friends alike.

Celebration of Textiles is funded in part by the D.C. Commission on the Arts & Humanities, an agency supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts. The festival is part of the Dupont-Kalorama Museums Consortium’s Museum Walk Weekend. For more information about Walk Weekend, visit www.dkmuseums.com.

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World Premiere of Documentary Film on Mid-Century Design coincides with Art by the Yard Opening

04/26/2010 — tmpressroom

Chevron (detail), 1968. Lucienne Day. Manufactured by Heal Fabrics. Jill A. Wiltse and H. Kirk Brown III Collection of British Textiles.

The first public screening of Contemporary Days: Robin and Lucienne Day Design the UK, produced by Design Onscreen— The Initiative for Architecture and Design on Film, will coincide with the opening of the exhibition Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain at The Textile Museum. The 90-minute film premieres at 7:30 p.m. on May 15, 2010 at the National Geographic Museum’s Grosvenor Auditorium (1145 17th Street NW, Washington, D.C.). A question and answer session with award-winning Scottish Director Murray Grigor and Cinematographer Hamid Shams will follow the screening. General public tickets are $15, including free garage parking, and may only be purchased online and in advance through Design Onscreen (www.designonscreen.org).

Robin and Lucienne Day. Courtesy of Design Onscreen.

About the Film

Robin and Lucienne Day transformed British design after World War II with striking furniture and textiles that signaled a new modernist sensibility for everyday living. Lucienne’s abstract textile designs brought accessible elegance into the homes of postwar British consumers. Robin’s revolutionary furniture designs introduced materials such as plastic, steel and plywood to homes, offices and schools. Together, their fresh design approach helped fuel the artistic and commercial awakening that led Britain out of the devastation of World War II. The film traces the Days’ personal and professional progression over the course of their careers, spanning more than 70 years–from their days at the Royal College of the Arts in the 1930s, through their long heyday at the forefront of British design, to their recent rediscovery by new generations of design aficionados.

About the Filmmakers

Director Murray Grigor is a Scottish filmmaker, writer and curator renowned for his films on architecture and design. His first film, on Charles Rennie Mackintosh, won five international awards, and he has since co-authored The Architects’ Architect on Mackintosh’s international influence. Grigor’s other award-winning films include groundbreaking documentaries on Frank Lloyd Wright, Robert Adam and John Soane, and the landmark PBS series Pride of Place with Robert Stern. His most recent film, Infinite Space: The Architecture of John Lautner, has been a festival favorite since its premiere in 2008 at UCLA’s Hammer Museum. Cinematographer/Producer Hamid Shams has served as director, cinematographer and/or producer for numerous television commercials, music videos and short and feature documentary/narrative films, including Infinite Space: The Architecture of John Lautner, Tie-Died: Rock ’n Roll’s Most Dedicated Fans, and Painting the Town—all of which received highly favorable reviews for cinematography in major newspapers and festivals around the US and Europe.

About Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain

Opening May 15, Art by the Yard will be view at The Textile Museum through September 12, 2010, and is the first exhibition of its kind in Washington, D.C. The art of textile design changed radically after World War II as Britain was transformed from a country devastated by war into an optimistic consumer society. Three women designers were pivotal in this artistic revolution: Lucienne Day (1917- 2010), Jacqueline Groag (1903-1985) and Marian Mahler (1911-1983). Incorporating dramatic saturated colors and bold motifs inspired by artists like Alexander Calder and Joan Miró, these young designers transformed the market by inspiring elegant yet affordable product lines that brought the world of contemporary art into everyone’s homes. The exhibition showcases the work of these groundbreaking women designers through the display of textiles together with drawings and collages, ceramics and period furniture, all drawn from the Jill A. Wiltse and H. Kirk Brown III Collection of British Textiles.

About Design Onscreen

Design Onscreen is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit foundation dedicated to producing, promoting and preserving high-quality films on architecture and design. Founded in 2007 by Denver documentary enthusiasts Jill A. Wiltse and H Kirk Brown III, Design Onscreen’s other architectural documentaries include: William Krisel, Architect (screening at LA’s Getty Center in April 2010), Journeyman Architect: The Life and Work of Donald Wexler (2009) and Desert Utopia: Midcentury Architecture in Palm Springs (2009). Another Design Onscreen film, Hella Jongerius: Contemporary Archetypes (2009), premiered in May 2009 at New York’s Museum of Modern Art and Museum of Art and Design. Please visit www.designonscreen.org for more information.

To view the press release (PDF), click here.

To download the press kit for Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain, click here.

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The Textile Museum to participate in 27th annual Museum Walk Weekend

04/02/2010 — tmpressroom

The Textile Museum, part of the Dupont-Kalorama Museums Consortium (DKMC), is pleased to announce its participation in the 27th Annual Museum Walk Weekend, showcasing the art, history, and culture of two historic Washington, D.C. neighborhoods this summer. Anderson House, Dumbarton House, Fondo del Sol Visual Arts Center, General Federation of Women’s Clubs, Mary McLeod Bethune Council House National Historic Site, Meridian International Center, National Museum of American Jewish Military History, The Phillips Collection, The Textile Museum, and the Woodrow Wilson House will open their doors free of charge for this weekend-long celebration and chance to stretch your legs and your mind.
Museum Walk Weekend offers a variety of free activities for all ages. This year’s highlights include special museum exhibitions (covering everything from mid-century art and design to a president’s beloved walking sticks), DC Jazz Festival’s Jazz ‘n’ Families Fun Days at The Phillips Collection, popular food vendors, and a photo contest celebrating these neighborhood museums organized by Washington City Paper. Stay tuned to City Paper Events for more details about entry and prizes.
For the second year in a row, DKMC is also teaming up with the Washington Area Bicyclists Association to make Walk Weekend bicyclist friendly by providing a safe bike route and leading rides between sites.
An information table for the public, providing schedules and maps, will be situated at Dupont Circle on Saturday, June 5 and at the Dupont Circle FRESHFARM Market on Sunday, June 6.
The 27th Annual Museum Walk Weekend media sponsor is Washington City Paper. Museum Walk Weekend is supported by Cultural Tourism DC, with additional support provided by the Renaissance Dupont Circle Hotel.
Note: Not all museums will be open both days; event held rain or shine.
For more information or images, visit www.dkmuseums.org or contact Katy Clune at kclune@textilemuseum.org.

To view the press release (PDF), click here.

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Mid-Century Design Comes to Washington, D.C.

03/25/2010 — tmpressroom
Mahler Bird Chair

Untitled (Bird Chair), ca. 1953. Marian Mahler.

The fresh, innovative work of Lucienne Day (1917-2010) transformed the post-war British home and made stylish design available for all. The upcoming Textile Museum exhibition Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain showcases the work of Day and two of her contemporary female British designers: Jacqueline Groag (1903-1985) and Marian Mahler (1911-1983). Turning their backs on the austerity of the wartime era, Day, Groag, and Mahler took inspiration from modernist painters and helped pioneer a colorful and playful mid-century aesthetic, forever transforming the interior design industry. Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain is on view at The Textile Museum May 15 – September 12, 2010. About the Exhibition Featuring more than 50 colorful textiles drawn from the private Jill A. Wiltse and H. Kirk Brown III Collection of British Textiles, as well as select pieces of mid-century furniture, Art by the Yard is the first exhibit of its kind in Washington, D.C.  Magazines from the era featuring advertisements and profiles of these celebrity designers add context to the pieces on display. Noted as “full of imaginative fabrics by women who deserve more recognition” by Washington Post art critic Blake Gopnik, the exhibition opens in a year when high quality design on a limited budget is especially relevant.

The majority of the pieces in the exhibit were created by Lucienne Day, one of Britian’s most prolific and successful female designers. Her patterns, used for wallpapers, fabrics and tea towels, contributed to a distinctive 1950s and ‘60s aesthetic. Yet her sophisticated color choices and inventive references to nature remain surprisingly fresh. In 2005 Converse launched a shoe with her design Magnetic (1957), featured in the Textile Museum exhibition. Day, who passed away January 30, 2010, launched her career at the 1951 Festival of Britain. Her furnishing fabric Calyx, with its floating forms and bright colors, resonated with consumers and launched her international career. Along with her husband, furniture designer Robin Day, Lucienne believed in modern design’s transformative power to shape a better world and sought to create beautiful, useful objects accessible to all. Britain’s answer to American designer-duo Charles and Ray Eames, the Days became the poster couple for young and stylish homeowners.   

Select designs by Mahler and Groag are featured in Art by the Yard along with Lucienne Day’s work. Groag, originally from Czechoslovakia, is considered one of Britain’s most versatile designers. Her bold patterns were used for fabrics (both for the home and dress), furniture, wallpaper, and even in subway and airplane design. Mahler is renowned for her whimsical designs, with motifs ranging from birds to abstract forms. Her affordable textiles were seen in fashionable homes throughout Britain and complemented contemporary decorating styles. 

Untitled (Pebbles), ca. 1952. Jacqueline Groag.

The Textile Museum will present a full slate of exhibition-related programs to recall the era of Sputnik and Twiggy and bring the designs in Art by the Yard to life. Visiting scholars include Jennifer Harris, deputy director of the Whitworth Art Gallery at the University of Manchester, England and Dr. Pat Kirkham, professor at the Bard Graduate Center for the Studies in the Decorative Arts, Design and Culture. Look forward to period films such as The Best of Everything (screening in June) and a mid-century themed PM @ The TM after-hours party later in the summer. As Britain’s design industry was regaining momentum, Lucienne Day, Jacqueline Groag and Marian Mahler dared to offer a fresh approach to textile design in an era dominated by male professional artists. Believing that “good design” should be available for everyone, their products shaped the national aesthetic and continue to offer artistic inspiration and delight today.   

Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain is curated by Shanna Shelby (Curator, Jill A. Wiltse and H. Kirk Brown III Collection of British Textiles) and coordinated by Lee Talbot (Associate Curator, The Textile Museum). For more information or images, please contact Cyndi Bohlin at (202) 667-0441, ext. 78, or by e-mail at cbohlin@textilemuseum.org.

To request images online, CLICK HERE 

For the press release, CLICK HERE (pdf)

For a complete press kit, CLICK HERE (pdf)

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Work by designer Lucienne Day, who died Jan. 30, on view in upcoming TM exhibition

02/04/2010 — tmpressroom
Lucienne Day

Lucienne Day in 1952. Image courtesy the Whitworth Art Gallery, the University of Manchester.

The Textile Museum was saddened to learn that designer Lucienne Day, whose work will be featured in The Textile Museum’s 2010 spring/summer exhibition, Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain, passed away on January 30, 2010 at the age of 93. Britain’s best known textile designer in the post-World War II period, Day created award-winning designs for wallpapers, tea towels, carpets and ceramics. She was especially renowned for her lively, colorful furnishing fabric patterns.

“Lucienne Day’s career was unparalleled,” said Lee Talbot, The Textile Museum’s Associate Curator of Eastern Hemisphere Collections and Coordinating Curator of Art by the Yard. “Her remarkable body of textile art remains a fresh source of artistic inspiration and visual delight, even into the 21st century. I am pleased that we will be able to celebrate her creative designs with our Art by the Yard exhibition.”

A graduate of the Croydon School of Art (1934-7) and the Royal College of Art (1937-1940), Day’s commercial success began with her groundbreaking fabric Calyx, printed in 1951 by Heal Fabrics. Although the manufacturer was initially skeptical about Calyx’s avant-garde design, they decided to take a chance with the young designer’s refreshing and innovative ideas. This proved to be a brilliant choice for Heal, as Day soon became the star in the new era of British design. Her strengths as a textile designer stemmed from her sophisticated color choices, stylized references to nature, abstract forms and intriguing patterns inspired by Modernist painters such as Joan Miró and Paul Klee. Color was critical to the perfectionist and accomplished Day, so she worked closely with Heal Fabrics to ensure that her vision was properly executed in each “colourway” version of the final product. Although she worked for other furnishing fabric firms, it was Heal Fabrics for whom she produced over 70 textile designs.

Helix, 1970, Lucienne Day

Helix, 1970, Lucienne Day. Collection of Jill A. Wiltse and H. Kirk Brown, III.

Lucienne Day and her husband, furniture designer Robin Day (b. 1915), were key arbiters of taste as Britain’s most celebrated designer couple and together they popularized a sleek new aesthetic in British interiors. The couple was featured in a 1954 advertisement for a Hillman family car and a 1955 ad campaign for Smirnoff vodka. Magazine articles, such as one in the January 1954 issue of House and Garden spotlighting the Day’s London townhouse, allowed eager fans and consumers to peruse their choices in home décor. Lucienne and Robin Day came to personify the modern style in mid-century Britain, and consumers strove to emulate the lifestyle of this talented, successful, and attractive couple. Like many designers in the optimistic post-WWII period, they both believed in modern design’s transformative power to shape a better world, and sought to create beautiful, useful objects accessible to people of all income levels.

Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain, on view at The Textile Museum May 15, 2010 through September 12, 2010, illustrates the evolution of Day’s design style over the decades, from the playful linearity of her patterns in the early 1950s, to her experimentation with bold visual effects using black silk-screen patterns over fields of color in the late 1950s and early ‘60s, and finally her dynamic Pop style of the late 1960s and early ‘70s. Art by the Yard also includes textiles designed by two of Lucienne Day’s most accomplished contemporaries: Jacqueline Groag (1903-1985) and Marian Mahler (1911-1983).

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Upcoming TM Exhibit Features Textile Designed by the Late Artist Kenneth Noland

01/13/2010 — tmpressroom

A textile designed by the celebrated American abstract artist Kenneth Noland, who passed away on January 5, 2010, will be featured in an exhibition opening February 12, 2010 at The Textile Museum in Washington, D.C. The piece, Arizona Sky, dates to 1996 and was one of a series of tapestries designed by Noland and made by Navajo weavers.

Arizona Sky, woven by Mary Lee Begay and designed by Kenneth Noland

The textile will be featured in the exhibition The Art of Living: Textile Furnishings from the Permanent Collection, on view at The Textile Museum February 12, 2010 through January 9, 2011. The exhibit highlights the historical and cultural breadth of the museum’s collection through the display of 17 furnishing fabrics, including rugs, chair covers, cushions, wall hangings, and other textiles used in domestic interiors. The Art of Living provides a historical context for the museum’s major spring/summer exhibition, Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain, which focuses on the careers of three 20th-century British designers and the socio-historical circumstances that informed their design choices.

Arizona Sky illustrates the collaborative effort between Noland (1924-2010), Navajo weaver Mary Lee Begay (1941- ), and tapestry producer Gloria F. Ross (1923-1998), who was also a trustee at The Textile Museum. Ross endeavored to heighten public appreciation of tapestry as an art form, bringing painters and weavers together to create outstanding works of textile art. In 1979, Ross began to work with Navajo weavers to create tapestries based on designs by Noland, whose bold geometric paintings she saw as well suited for Navajo looms and colors. Navajo weavers typically visualize their designs mentally, rarely committing them to paper, but for this unusual collaboration six Navajo weavers agreed to work from Noland’s painted designs. 

“The art world has lost an influential and inspiring figure with the passing of Kenneth Noland,” says Lee Talbot, The Textile Museum’s Associate Curator for Eastern Hemisphere Collections and exhibition curator for The Art of Living: Textile Furnishings from the Permanent Collection. “We are proud to honor his legacy by showcasing his design in this exhibition.”

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Upcoming Exhibit Looks at Interior Design Fabrics from Around the World

12/08/2009 — tmpressroom
Tent Hanging

Tent hanging, Golconda, India, 1650 – 1780. The Textile Museum 6.129. Acquired by George Hewitt Myers in 1947.

In February 2010, The Textile Museum will begin a year-long look at the role of fabrics in interior design with the opening of The Art of Living: Textile Furnishings from the Permanent Collection. The exhibition highlights the historical and cultural breadth of the museum’s collection through the display of 17 furnishing fabrics, including rugs, chair covers, cushions, wall hangings, and other textiles used in domestic interiors. Made to provide protection and comfort, and to embellish homes from the ancient Mediterranean world to 20th-century America, these fabrics document the lifestyles enjoyed by their original owners as well as the technical and artistic accomplishment of their creators. The Art of Living: Textile Furnishings from the Permanent Collection will be on view February 12, 2010 through January 9, 2011.

About the Exhibition

The Art of Living explores how homes and furnishings shape the human experience of everyday life, and how each culture creates living environments that reflect its own social traditions, aesthetic preferences, political and economic circumstances, and local climate. The exhibition focuses particularly on the design of textile furnishings and the people who created their ornamental patterns. “Although one maker’s talented hands may produce a textile from fiber to finished product, more often the combined skills of many people—from spinners, dyers and designers to weavers or embroiderers—create the finished cloth,” explains exhibition curator Lee Talbot, associate curator for Eastern Hemisphere Collections at The Textile Museum. 

The Art of Living provides a historical context for the museum’s major spring/summer exhibition, Art by the Yard: Women Design Mid-Century Britain, which focuses on the careers of three 20th-century British designers and the socio-historical circumstances that informed their design choices. The Art of Living sheds light on these women’s forebears—the talented artists who created textile patterns in centuries past.

Exhibition Highlights

The earliest textile in The Art of Living is a 5th-century tapestry-woven fragment found in Egypt, which may have covered a bolster pillow. In the Roman and Byzantine Empires, as in many urban cultures around the world, professional artists drew designs on paper to be adapted for a variety of media. A few of their drawings on papyrus have survived, some of which appear to be cartoons for tapestry woven fabrics. This fragment features scrolling vines, rosettes and birds—motifs developed by artists in the Mediterranean world but adopted by designers worldwide. 

An 11th- or 12th-century Chinese silk documents how the naturalistic rendering of bird and flower patterns, as well as the tapestry technique, spread along the Silk Road from the West to East Asia. Like their counterparts in the West, Chinese artists typically drew cartoons for tapestries and designs for other fine decorative arts on paper. With the export of silks and ceramics, the flower and animal patterns developed over the centuries by Chinese artists became some of the most influential designs in the world. In this exhibition, a throne cover from Bhutan appliquéd with bird and flower patterns and a colonial Peruvian wall hanging fragment depicting phoenixes and peonies illustrate the global reach of these decorative motifs.

The Designers

Although the names of very few textile designers from the ancient world are known today, surviving records from 18th century onward, particularly in Western countries, more readily link the names of individual artists to particular designs. Four textiles in The Art of Living can be attributed to known designers: Ghiyath al-Din Ali, a designer/weaver who achieved high rank at the court of Abbas I (1571-1629) in Iran; William Morris (1834-1896), the seminal 19th-century British designer; and Kenneth Noland (1924- ), an American abstract painter who provided designs for a series of tapestries woven by Navajo weavers. Bridging Art by the Yard with The Art of Living is a special loan from the Cora Gingsberg Gallery—an exquisite silk designed Anna Maria Garthwaite (1690–1763), one of Britain’s most prolific and highly regarded textile designers of the 18th century. 

Whether anonymous or highly celebrated, the designers represented in The Art of Living enhanced the daily lives of the people who originally used these beautifully patterned fabrics in their homes, and they continue to delight viewers today with their artistry.

For more information or images, please contact Cyndi Bohlin at (202) 667-0441, ext. 78, or by e-mail at cbohlin@textilemuseum.org.

For more information, or to view the press release, CLICK HERE (pdf)

To see selections from the exhibition, CLICK HERE (pdf)

To request images for press use online, CLICK HERE

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The Textile Museum’s Activity Gallery Closed December 8 – 25 for Refurbishment

12/08/2009 — tmpressroom

The Textile Museum’s Activity Gallery will be closed December 8-25, 2009 for refurbishment. Located on the museum’s second level, the Activity Gallery was created in 1997 to educate visitors unfamiliar with textiles about how they are made and the ways in which cultural traditions, the environment and even the economy influence the character of handmade textiles.

In the Activity Gallery, visitors are encouraged to learn by touching, looking and doing. Touchable textiles ranging from a pile carpet to bark cloth illustrate the structures, techniques and processes used to create traditional textiles. Samples of fibers in various stages of processing (from silk worm cocoons to silk thread) and examples of dyestuffs (including crushed bugs!) are used to explain how natural fibers are prepared for weaving and how color has been imparted to fiber for thousands of years.

The refurbishment is intended to update the Activity Gallery and create a more flexible space that can accommodate exhibit-related hands-on activities for school groups and visiting families. “Through the generous support of a private donor, we are able to make changes in the Activity Gallery that will better serve our youth and family audiences,” explains Tom Goehner, the museum’s curator of education. “We plan to move the kiosks in the center of the gallery to the perimeters, and then add tables for hands-on projects and textile making.” This the first phase of the gallery refurbishment; the long-term goals are to incorporate an introductory video about the textile arts and additional computers, creating links between technology of the 21st century and handmade textile traditions stemming back thousands of years.

For more information, or to view the press release, CLICK HERE (pdf)

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Contemporary Fabrics from the Nuno Corporation on view at The Textile Museum this Fall

08/19/2009 — tmpressroom

Reiko Sudo

The Textile Museum will present  Fabrics of Feathers and Steel: The Innovation of Nuno, October 17, 2009 – April 11, 2010 to complement the couture designs on display in the concurrent exhibition Contemporary Japanese Fashion: The Mary Baskett Collection. Nuno (meaning “functional fabric” in Japanese) integrates traditional techniques and aesthetics with cutting-edge technologies to create some of the world’s most innovative and influential fabrics. Made out of materials as varied as steel, bamboo and bird feathers, Nuno textiles provide the starting point for fashion designers and are housed in museum collections around the world.

The Nuno Studio

The international success of Japanese fashion designers owes much to the talented textile designers and manufacturers who enable their creative visions. Japan maintains a particularly rich textile tradition, and in recent decades has emerged as the world’s leading producer of technologically advanced fabrics. Founded by Junichi Arai and Reiko Sudo in 1984, Nuno has been under the direction of Sudo since 1987 and has developed from selling traditional Japanese textiles to applying handmade techniques in innovative ways. Following the mantra “Why Knot?,” Nuno experiments with an eclectic array of materials, as well as unorthodox finishing methods, such as burnishing, burning and chemical dissolving to produce their fabrics. Everyday materials such as steel and cotton are transformed by hand and machine into ethereal and compelling textiles that are renowned around the world. Deftly interweaving the traditional and the experimental, hand production and machine-made, Nuno creates beautiful and often conceptually witty fabrics that reassert the rich artistic potential of the textile medium.

About the Exhibition

The exhibition at The Textile Museum will feature 18 examples from the Nuno studio, dating from the time of the company’s founding in 1984 to the present day. The fabrics will be hung in galleries adjacent to the showing of Contemporary Japanese Fashion: The Collection of Mary Baskett, inviting visitors to experience the design process from start to finish – from structure to style. “In contrast to their Western counterparts, Japanese designers usually begin with the fabric, or even the thread, as the starting point in their design process. Innovative textile technolgies such as those pioneered by Nuno have been pivotal in creating the distinctive forms characteristic of Japanese fashion, so these two exhibitions complement each other in an exciting and very meaningful way,” says Lee Talbot, associate curator for Eastern Hemisphere Collections at The Textile Museum. Maryclaire Ramsey, CEO of The Textile Museum says, “We are excited to be opening these two exhibitions this fall – and feel they are both relevant in a city with a growing high-fashion scene and a strong international presence.” The Textile Museum Fall Symposium, “From Kimono to Couture: The Evolution of Japanese Fashion,” October 16 to 19, 2009, will continue on themes from both shows and will feature lectures by leading scholars in the fashion field from around the country.

For more information, or to view the press release CLICK HERE (pdf)

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