Exhibition: "Couleurs de vie, vie en couleurs" at Casa Africa, Nantes – some views.

Click on the photos to enlarge. Thanks to Anne Grosfilley for the photographs. For more details of the xhibition and the catalogue please visit the website.

Tioup, tak, etc. - Couleurs textiles du Sénégal : Some photos.

French African textile expert Anne Grosfilley who kindly sent these photographs wrote -  “Here are some photographs on the exhibition about dyeing in Sénégal. It is superb, full of Colours. It is set as a series of portraits, so you can read the story of the people behind the crafts, and learn about their training and everyday Life. All the aspects of dyeing are presented, from traditional plants to synthetic dyes, from dyeing to tailoring. The exhibition ends in a tailor workshop, where you can have a go trying on boubous of different styles. All the steps of the transformation of the cloth allow to understand the process to get the different patterns. Unfortunately, there is no catalogue, but a series of lectures and workshops.  This is an exhibition I recommend, and the Clermont Ferrand Bargoin Textile museum is a place to know, as they have a big interest in Africa. Their next project is to host the exhibition of the second edition of FITE (International Festival of Extraordinary Textiles), and after that they curate an exhibition on unusual Moroccan carpets.”

The exhibition “Tioup, tak, etc. - Couleurs textiles du Sénégal” continues at Musée Bargoin, Clermont-Ferrand, France until March 31. There is a programme of events, details here.

Click on the photos to enlarge. All photos copyright Anne Grosfilley. If you don’t already have it, do lookout for Anne’s book which is still available via Amazon.

Recent European Publications on African Textiles

A brief round-up of recent European publications on sub-Saharan African textiles. A later post will cover recent books on African fashion. French Africanist booksellers Soumbala (www.soumbala.com) are a good source for most of these.

	Kerstin Bauer, Kleidung und Kleidungspraktiken im Nordern der Cote d'Ivoire (Lit Verlag, 2007) is Bauer's important doctoral thesis (University of Basel, 2005) which highlights the crucial but previously under appreciated role of the Dioula in West African textile history.
	Mai Diop, Pagnes... Panos... Les etoffes magnetique des Mandjak - Guinee Bissau - Cap Vert - Senegal (Les Ateliers d'Art Tesss, Saint-Louis) Beautifully produced booklet on Mandjak and Cape Verde cloths.
	Bouilloc, C et.al. Afrique Bleue: les routes de l'indigo (Edisud, 2000) - exhibition catalogue
	Anne Grosfilley, Afrique des Textiles (Edisud, 2005) - useful introduction to current textile production with emphasis on Francophone West African
	Anne Grosfilley, Textiles d'Afrique: entre tradition et modernite (Edition Point de Vues, 2006) - exhibition catalogue
	Mali: Photographies et Textiles Contemporains (Musee de Design et D'Arts Appliques Contemporains, Lausanne, 2003) - small exhibition catalogue
	Pauline Duponchel, Textiles Bogolan du Mali (Musee d'Ethnographie, Neuchatel, 2004) - important and substantial publication based on years of field research.
	Gravellini, Anne-Chantal, and Annie Ringuede. Blues et ocres de Guinee: Teintures vegetales sur textiles. (Paris: Sepia. 2005) - beautiful book with extensive photography
	Patricia Gerimont, Teinturieres a Bamako: Quand la couleur sort de sa reserve (Ibis, 2008) - superb and very well illustrated.
	Anne-Marie Bouttiaux et al. African Costumes and Textiles: From the Berbers to the Zulus (5 Continents, 2008) - coffee table book of Belgian private collection, worth getting for the costumes, hats etc, but the West African textiles are disappointingly ordinary and in some cases wrongly labelled.