An exceptional silk and cotton Yoruba wrapper.

NW513 -Fine and rare Yoruba women's wrapper cloth dating from late C19th or early C20th with an exceptionally complex and subtle array of warp stripes incorporating magenta trans-Saharan silk "alaari" in an indigo dyed hand spun cotton ground. Unlike strip woven aso oke produced by male weavers, these cloths were woven in two wide panels on an upright single heddle loom by a woman weaver. The use of silk in these women's weave wrappers was an established tradition in the C19th and at the start of the C20th, allowing wealthy women to outshine the plainer blue and white style.

However today it is extremely hard to find surviving examples and almost all those we do see have been patched or repaired. These cloths are not well represented in museum collections and published sources, reflecting their rarity but one piece collected before 1890 and now in the American Museum of Natural History, New York may be seen here. This is a particularly fine completely intact example in excellent condition and with an unusually elaborate configuration of stripes. It would have been an heirloom cloth passed down from mother to daughter over several generations. It retains it's very neat hand stitched seams throughout. Measurements: 78ins x 66ins, 200cm x 168cm

Click on the photos to enlarge.‘ To see this cloth and others in our online gallery of Nigerian women’s weaving click here.

Popeye–Japanese Magazine

Exhibition:- “Seeing Red: World Textiles” in Bloomington, Indiana

Ivy Tech John Waldron Arts Center, Bloomington, Indiana August 28 to September 26, 2015

“This September 2015 Lotus Arts and Education Foundation in conjunction with Ivy Tech John Waldron Gallery will present an exhibition of rare and unusual textiles featuring the color red. “Seeing Red: World Textiles” features over forty hand woven and constructed textiles dating from Egyptian to modern times. Seven Indiana collectors -- Suzanne Halvorson, Joan Hart, William Itter, Barbara Livesey, Harold Mailand, and George Malacinski, met this past February to review and select textiles from their collections composed of every shade of red. All of the textiles revealed that red can be a dominant color that shapes and defines a textile’s ingenious construction and cultural prominence. Not only is red a color of great optical range, it is a color of many personal, emotional, and theoretical meanings. This exhibit ventures to explore the diversity of red and its identity as a beautiful color. This exhibit opens Friday, August 28th, and concludes Saturday, September 26th, the weekend of Lotus World Music and Arts Festival (see: lotusfest.org).”

Click on the photos to enlarge. All photos © William Itter.

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“Kongo: Power and Majesty” at the Met.

I already mentioned the show but this important exhibition really is a unique, once in a lifetime, opportunity to view many of the earliest surviving African textiles, drawn together from numerous  museum collections across Europe. A few years ago I went all the way to Ulm to see the cloth below (okay and a couple of others.) Don’t miss it !

Date: 16th–17th century, inventoried 1659

Geography: Democratic Republic of the Congo; Angola; Republic of the Congo Culture: Kongo peoples; Kongo Kingdom Medium: Raffia Dimensions: L. 75 9/16 in. (192 cm), H. 59 7/16 in (151 cm) [excluding 5 1/2 in (14 cm) perimeter fringe ] Classification: Textiles-Woven Credit Line: Kunst- und Wunderkammer des Christoph Weickmann, Ulmer Museum, Ulm, Germany

Note that this astonishingly fine cloth above is almost two metres square – looking at the photos it is too easy to visualize it as the small Kuba squares that we are so familiar with.

 

Luxury Cloth: Cushion Cover

Date: 17th–18th century, inventoried 1737. Geography: Democratic Republic of the Congo; Angola; Republic of the Congo Culture: Kongo peoples; Kongo Kingdom. Medium: Raffia Dimensions: 21 1/4 in. (54 cm) × 21 1/4 in. (54 cm)Classification: Textiles-Woven Credit Line: Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen

Prestige Cap (Mpu)

Date: 16th–17th century, inventoried 1674 Geography: Democratic Republic of the Congo; Angola; Republic of the Congo Culture: Kongo peoples; Kongo Kingdom Medium: Raffia or pineapple fiber Dimensions: H. 7 1/8 (18 cm), Diam. 5 7/8 in. (15 cm) Classification: Textiles-Non-Woven Credit Line: Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen

 

Prestige Cap (Mpu)

Date: 17th–18th century, inventoried 1876  Geography: Democratic Republic of the Congo; Republic of the Congo; Angola Culture: Kongo peoples Medium: Raffia or pineapple fiber Dimensions: H. 8 7/8 in. (22.5 cm), Diam. 6 1/4 in. (15.9 cm) Classification: Textiles-Non-Woven Credit Line: MIBACT-–Polo Museale del Lazio, Museo Preistorico Etnografico Luigi Pigorini, Rome

 

Garment (Nkutu)

Date: 19th century, inventoried 1853 Geography: Democratic Republic of the Congo; Angola; Republic of the Congo Culture: Kongo peoples Medium: Raffia. Dimensions: 31 1/8 × 49 1/4 in. (79 × 125 cm) Classification: Textiles-Costumes Credit Line: British Museum, London

 

 

Cloth of the month: A fine blue and white Asante kente.

K260 - Exceptional Asante mixed strip blue and white cotton kente cloth. Composed of four repeats of six different strip patterns, this cloth is notable both for the fine quality of the weaving and for the addition of borders (a feature not usually found on Asante blue and white cloths of this type.) The interaction between the blue extra weft float motifs that make up the border and the different blue and white patterns beneath makes a subtle and interesting visual impact. In excellent complete condition. Dates from early to mid C20th. Measurement: 127 ins x 75, 323 cm x 190.

Click on the photos to enlarge. See this cloth on our New Acquisitions Gallery or visit our Asante Kente Gallery.