A Companion to Textile Culture
Description
A lively and innovative collection of new and recent writings on the cultural contexts of textiles
The study of textile culture is a dynamic field of scholarship which spans disciplines and crosses traditional academic boundaries. A Companion to Textile Culture is an expertly curated compendium of new scholarship on both the historical and contemporary cultural dimensions of textiles, bringing together the work of an interdisciplinary team of recognized experts in the field. The Companion provides an expansive examination of textiles within the broader area of visual and material culture, and addresses key issues central to the contemporary study of the subject.
A wide range of methodological and theoretical approaches to the subject are explored-technological, anthropological, philosophical, and psychoanalytical, amongst others-and developments that have influenced academic writing about textiles over the past decade are discussed in detail. Uniquely, the text embraces archaeological textiles from the first millennium AD as well as contemporary art and performance work that is still ongoing. This authoritative volume:
- Offers a balanced presentation of writings from academics, artists, and curators
- Presents writings from disciplines including histories of art and design, world history, anthropology, archaeology, and literary studies
- Covers an exceptionally broad chronological and geographical range
- Provides diverse global, transnational, and narrative perspectives
- Included numerous images throughout the text to illustrate key concepts
A Companion to Textile Culture is an essential resource for undergraduate and postgraduate students, instructors, and researchers of textile history, contemporary textiles, art and design, visual and material culture, textile crafts, and museology.
More details
Other editions
Additional editions
Person
Jennifer Harris is an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Manchester, UK. Now retired, she was Deputy Director at the Whitworth Art Gallery, holding one of the finest collections of historical and contemporary textiles in the UK. Harris has researched and published in the fields of fashion, textiles, and avant-garde craft for more than thirty years. Her book 5000 Years of Textiles, first published in 1993 and reprinted several times, continues to be a standard text in the field.
Content
Acknowledgments xi
List of Figures xiii
Series Editor's Preface xvii
Notes on Contributors xix
General Introduction 1
Part I Histories and Frameworks 7
1 Unraveling the Fabric of the Past: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Archaeological Textiles 11
Margarita Gleba
2 Textile Cultures in the Early Modern World 27
Robert S. DuPlessis
3 Rewriting Textile Culture with Woven Words: "Oro es tu hilar" by Chilean Poet Cecilia Vicuña 45
Meredith G. Clark
4 Branding Tradition: The Commercialization of Hand Embroidery in Gujarat 61
Eiluned Edwards
5 "The Real Thing": How Object Analysis Unlocks Meaning and Enriches Documentary Evidence 83
Adrienne D. Hood
Part II Textiles, Trade, and Global Culture 105
6 Reading Textiles: Transmission and Technology of Silk Road Textiles in the First Millennium 109
Angela Sheng
7 West Africa: Technology, Tradition, and Lurex Revisited 127
John Picton
8 Textiles of Eastern and Southern Africa 145
Chris Spring
9 Remaking Tradition in Art and Design in Pakistan 165
Naazish Ata-Ullah, Zeb Bilal and Shehnaz Ismail
Part III The Social Fabric: The Politics and Poetics of Cloth 181
10 Fabricating Identity: Textiles in the Pacific 187
Paul Sharrad
11 Stitching (in) Trauma: Constructing Identity in Thread Behind Prison Bars 201
Maureen Daly Goggin
12 Creative Tensions: Making (It), Unmaking, and Making Do in Textiles Informed by Feminism 219
Alexandra Kokoli
13 Spinning a Yarn of One's Own 235
Christine Checinska
14 Pictures and Polemics: Muslim Veiling Practices in Contemporary Art 257
Valerie Behiery
15 The Subversive Stitch Revisited 275
Lisa Vinebaum
Part IV Conceptual Boundaries 299
16 Modernism's Roots in the Domestic, Decorative, and Vernacular Through Textiles 303
Virginia Gardner Troy
17 Material Strategies: Cloth and Textile Metaphors in Modern and Contemporary Art 317
Jennifer Harris
18 Pragmatics of Attachment and Detachment: A Constellatory Reinscription of Textile 333
Maxine Bristow
19 Japanese Textile Culture: The Example of Junichi Arai and Five Other Creators 353
Akiko Moriyama
20 Stories of Innovation: Fabrication in Africa and Beyond 371
Atta Kwami
Part V Reception and Representation 391
21 Around the World in 80 Biennials: Curating Lausanne, Hangzhou, Kaunas 395
Janis Jefferies and Lee Weinberg
22 Indigenous Textiles of North America: A Century of Exhibitions 417
Elizabeth Kalbfleisch and Janet Catherine Berlo
23 Valorizing Gee's Bend Quilts: Affinity, Adjacency, and the Modern Eye 435
Karin E. Peterson and Leisa Rundquist
24 Performing the Political in Oceanian Textile Cultures: Collectivity, Syncretism, and Globalization 459
Khadija von Zinnenburg Carroll
Index 475
List of Figures
1.1a Example of mineralized weft-faced tabby weave cloth from Greece, early first millennium BCE. 1.1b Example of twill weave cloth from Italy, early first millennium BCE. 1.2a European mouflon ram (Ovis orientalis musimon), Chemnitz, Germany. 1.2b Poll merino ram. 1.3 Bronze Age discoid loom weight from Miletos, Turkey. 1.4 Terracotta oil flask (Lekythos) depicting women weaving at a vertical, warp-weighted loom, c. 550-530 BCE. Attributed to the Amasis painter (sixth century BCE). 4.1 Detail of Jat embroidery on "art panel" hanging made by KMVS (NGO), 2003. 4.2 Hands of Dhebaria Rabari woman embroidering a blouse, 1996. 4.3 Vagadia Rabari wedding, northeast Kachchh, 1997. 4.4 Dowry embroideries refashioned into tourist goods. Udaipur, Rajasthan, 2004. 4.5 Shrujan embroiderers at a course to upgrade skills, 2003. 5.1a "Log Cabin" quilt (front) in the Textile Museum of Canada, Toronto. 5.1b "Log Cabin" quilt (reverse). 5.2 "Loghouse Quilting," illustrated in S. F. A. Caulfield and B. C. Saward, The Dictionary of Needlework (1882). 5.3 "Log Cabin" quilt (detail). 5.4 Quilt from Pakistan (ralli), mid-twentieth century. 5.5 Quilt from Canada, early twentieth century. 5.6 "Log Cabin" quilt (folded). 5.7 "Log Cabin" quilt (detail of reverse). 5.8 "Log Cabin" quilt (detail of one square unit). 5.9 "Log Cabin" quilt (rough sketch of one square unit made by the author). 5.10a Letter outlining possible history of "Log Cabin" quilt. 5.10b Letter outlining possible history of "Log Cabin" quilt. 5.11 "Log Cabin" quilt (detail). 7.1 A weaver and his loom in Bonwire, one of the major weaving centers of the Asante nation, Ghana,1984. 7.2 A weft-float design emerging on the loom at the house of Sylvanus Akakpo, a weaving master in Kpetoe, Volta Region, Ghana,1999. 7.3 Afranie Buobu, Bonwire, Asante, Ghana, hand stitching four-inch-wide strips of woven cloth side by side, 1995. 8.1 Printed cloth (kanga) from Zanzibar, c. 2002. 8.2 Two women, possibly of the Makua people, Mozambique, late nineteenth century. 8.3 Seana Marena ("King's Blanket") made by Aranda Textile Mills (Pty) Ltd, South Africa, c. 2012. 9.1 Cotton turban sample from Jeypoor in Rajpootana, from The Collections of the Textile Manufacturers of India, by John Forbes Watson, published in 1866. 9.2 Aisha Khalid (Pakistan). Water has never feared the fire (detail), 2018. Fabric, gold-plated and steel pins. 9.3 Ruby Chishti (Pakistan). The Present Is a Ruin Without the People, 2016. Recycled textiles, wire mesh, thread, wood, embellishment, metal scrapes, and archival glue; with sound. 9.4 Handloom-woven cotton. Manufactured by Khaadi Corporation Limited, Karachi, Pakistan. 10.1 Sopolemalama Filipe Tohi (Tonga/New Zealand). Pulekafa, 2003-12, Kulasi, 2003-12, Pulefakalava, 2006, and Haufa'a, 2009. 10.2 Eastern Highlands women with Papua New Guinea bilum adornments, Goroka show, September 2014. 11.1 Embroidery by Janie Terrero, made in Holloway Prison, 1912. 11.2 Frantiska Albrechtová, Prisoner of War signature handkerchief, stitched 1942. 13.1 Sonia Boyce (UK). Big Women's Talk, 1984. Pastels on paper. 13.2 Vanley Burke (Jamaica/UK). Handsworth Park Liberation Day Rally, 1977. 13.3 Journey to the Land of Promise (West Indian Immigration into Southampton Docks, UK). 14.1 Zineb Sedira (France). La maison de ma mère, 2002. Installation of 12 color photographs. 14.2 Khosrow Hassanzadeh (Iran). Terrorist: Nadjibeh, 2004. Silkscreen and acrylic on canvas. 14.3 Zineb Sedira (France). Silent Sight, 2000. Video projection (black and white, sound). Film 16 mm. Soundtrack by Edith Marie Pasquier. 14.4 Zineb Sedira (France). Silent Sight, 2000. Video projection (black and white, sound). Film 16 mm. Soundtrack by Edith Marie Pasquier. 15.1 Aram Han Sifuentes, A Mend (A Collection of Scraps from Local Seamstresses and Tailors), 2011-2013. Jean cuff remnants from 23 seamstresses and tailors and gold jean thread. 15.2 U.S. Citizenship Test Sampler (Made by noncitizens living and working in the United States), 2013-present. 24 out of 120 samplers. Embroidery floss, sequins, beads on linen. 15.3 Sewing Rebellion (Shirt Apron Production) at the Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach CA, 2019. 15.4 Sewing Rebellion (Shirt Apron Production). Melissa Tran, Happy Participant in blue, Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach CA, 2019. 17.1 Installation view of the 2014 Biennial (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 7-25 May 2014). Sheila Hicks, Pillar of Inquiry/Supple Column, 2013-14. 17.2 Faith Wilding (USA). Crocheted Environment, 1972/1995. Woolworth's Sweetheart acrylic yarn and sisal rope. 17.3 El Anatsui (Ghana). Fresh and Fading Memories: Part I-IV, 2007. Aluminum and copper wire. 17.4 Risham Syed (Pakistan). The Seven Seas, 2012. Seven cotton quilts installation. 17.5 Louise Bourgeois (France/USA). Rejection, 2001. Fabric, steel and lead. 18.1 Maxine Bristow (UK). 3 x 19 Intersecting a Seam, 1999. Linen, ticking, cotton, cotton wadding, and gesso. 18.2 Maxine Bristow (UK). Concertina catalogue: classificatory configuration of practice components, 2015. 18.3 Maxine Bristow (UK). Exhibition installation: University of Chester, UK, 2014. 18.4 Maxine Bristow (UK). Exhibition installation: University of Chester, UK, 2014. 19.1 Junichi Arai (Japan). Woven Structure Pattern (detail), designed by Junichi Arai, 1981-84. Wool, acrylic; jacquard, double weave. 19.2 Junichi Arai, Tradition and Creation exhibition (installation view), Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, 2013. 19.3 Junichi Arai, Tradition and Creation exhibition (installation view), Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, 2013. 20.1 Togbe Takyi IX, Chief of Biakpa town in Avatime State, with his courtiers and kinsmen, 1996. 20.2 El Anatsui (Ghana). Strained Roots, 2014. Aluminum and copper wire. 20.3 Ibrahim Mahama (Ghana). K.N.U.S.T. Museum (installation). Kumasi, Ghana, 2013. 20.4 Syowia Kyambi (Kenya). WoMen, Fräulein Damsel & Me/Phase II Release (performance still),...
