tribaltextiles.info

I was exchanging emails with Jean Howe of 'Threads of Life' and cheekily took the opportunity to ask her if she or any of her colleagues recognised this textile. Jean kindly came back with:

I have started having a look through books for textiles from Alor. In 'Handwoven Textiles of South-East Asia' by Sylvia Fraser-Lu, page 208 she has a section on 'Solor-Alor Archipelagos'.

My edition of the book is the paperback edition of 1989. ISBN 0-19588954 1. I am not sure if it has been reprinted or there are copies around. I find I quite often come back to it for its weaving focus.

If/when I hear anything more from Jean when Lolet returns I will share it with the forum.

_________________
Pamela

http://www.tribaltextiles.info
on-line tribal textiles resource

Well, what fun this has been! My textile has travelled over what seems to be half the world so far. I really appreciate everyone's input and look forward to any further discussion. Jean Howe's response is very interesting and I'm very interested to hear what she may have to add in the near future. I'm also interested to hear what MAC will have to contribute when he returns. Thanks especially Pamela for your efforts in keeping this thread alive. Cheers

Warren

Greetings all from Kansas!!! Indeed it has been interesting to read the many responses and ideas about Warren's textile. I was hoping we might hear something from Eric Anderson but it seems he doesn't follow the forum these days. When I saw Warren's textile I thought right away of the two Isinai blankets that I mentioned in my first post as well as the two that I have. Isinai blankets are so rare that these were the only four I had seen. I thought someone in the Banaue area of Ifugao, where an attempt to revive the ikat technique has been under way for some years, had seen the book People and Art of the Philippines and was trying to copy the Isinai blanket in it.

After checking the two pieces in the books and getting out my two and then looking again at Warren's piece, I am almost certain that what he has is an Isinai blanket. Sylvia says in her book that Isinai blankets were highly prized and traded to other tribes and even copied by other tribes. I don't know where she got her info but I would think that if the Isinai were producing blankets for trade to other tribes and if they were so highly prized and copied, there should be more of them around. If they were used as funeral blankets and buried with the dead this may explain their rarity.

I have been to the islands of N.T.T. , Solor, Adonara, Lembata, Pantar, and Alor several times and have dozens of textiles from each of these islands. They are almost all tubular skirts used in the wedding exchange and I don't remember seeing any large blankets on the scale of double bed size in four panels such as Warren's piece so I think we can rule out Alor or Lembata. The only textiles I have seen which are very similar to Warren's are the Isinai blankets. When I get back to Japan I will photo and post my two pieces to compare. I did find listed on a University of Nebraska site an Isinai blanket but access was restricted to students etc.. I emailed asking how I might get permission to view that textile but have had no response. Anyone with U. of N. connections?

The book The Philippines Past and Present, written by the American Minister of the Interior for the Philippines, in 1913, details his three trips through the northern mountains of the Philippines prior to 1908. He was quite interested in surveying all of the tribes of the Philippines and lists them all. His list and 900 plus page book makes no mention of the Isinai tribe however. The mystery tribe, the mystery textile!!!

Best regards till later, MAC

It's Sumba. Kodi area. But a real, real oddball.

_________________
Susi Johnston
www.macan-tidur-textiles.com
www.susijohnston.com

Susi, I wonder if you have ever seen a Kodi textile that was composed of 4 narrow panels with 4 vertical, red stripes? I haven't had mine out for a while but I seem to remember that they were two, rather wide panels and had only two vertical stripes, I think in yellow commercial thread, near the outer edges. I seem to remember seeing Mamuli (earring) motifs in a piece or two but generally Kodi textiles have diamond and other geometric motifs. I don't remember ever seeing one with figures of crocs, humans etc. like those in Warren's textile. I got my pieces when I visited Kodi in the 70s.

Now that I am back in Japan I will try to get my two Isinai blankets, from northern Luzon in the Philippines,out and photographed to compare.

Do you collect textiles from the Philippines or other countries besides Indonesia? I was told on Roti that Rotinese had migrated to Madagascar. You wouldn't happen to have any textiles from there would you? You wouldn't have any access to Nabraska University would you? They list an Isinai textile but access was restricted and I couldn't get a look at it.

All of the ideas about Warren's textile have been interesting and the search goes on. Is there anyone else out there who collects Philippine textiles or who has an Isinai textile?

Best Regards, MAC

I've never had a Kodi textile with exactly that composition. But I can tell you, I've had some Kodi textiles that were composed in other idiosyncratic, completely unique ways . . . and sizes . . . and designs. Those people are ODD out there!

Remember, most of the villages are largely abandoned. The people have left, urbanised, gone to be domestic or construction labourers overseas or in wealthier parts of Indonesia (Jakarta, Bali) . . . in many traditional villages there's basically nobody there but the aged, a handful of little kids maybe, and sick or disabled people.

Given that situation, which has been the case for some time, discontinuity (and random invention) in traditions like weaving is not surprising at all.

Here are some pictures of me in Kodi a couple of years ago . . . that's what the traditional villages look like. Sad.

_________________
Susi Johnston
www.macan-tidur-textiles.com
www.susijohnston.com

Hi Susi, Wow! What a difference a couple of decades make! I was in Kodi for a couple of days in the early 80s. That is when I collected my pieces. Seems things have changed a lot since then! It is happening all over and I guess it has been happening since the beginning of the first tribes.

In the universe
Change is the only constant
Bewasamwillbe

Thanks for the update, MAC

Here at last are the photos of the two textiles in my collection that I think are made by the Isinai. The local supplier who brought them to me in Baguio said they were Apayao blankets as he got them in the Apayao area. He specializes in textiles and knows his cloth but Isinai pieces are so rare that I doubt he has ever heard of them, though he passes through the towns where the Isinai live every time he comes to Baguio on the bus. He has never spoken of the Isinai tribe or their textiles in all the years I have known him.

The first, ikat patterned blanket was collected in June of 1998 and the one with the woven patterns in 1996. In the 20 years I have spent going to the Philippines and collecting textiles, these are the only two pieces I have seen that I think are from the Isinai. I have seen two pieces published (noted earlier in this post) so that makes a total of FOUR ONLY!
If anyone else out there has one or knows of one that can be seen somewhere please let me know.

The crocodile and human figures on Warren's textile are similar to ikat motifs found (rarely) on Ifugao textiles but I have never seen an Ifugao blanket like his. I have been to Ifugao many times but found few textiles other than newly woven pieces. Perhaps Warren's textile is an Ifugao copy of an Isinai blanket with Ifugao motifs added but again I have never seen anything like it in Ifugao.

Pamela, I thought my photos were too wide at first as all of the text could not be seen. I have deleted, resized and reattached several times and everything was finally visible in the preview. However, when I submitted the post everything came out too wide again. Any idea why or advice about correcting it? Sorry it can't be read or the photos viewed fully without scrolling. MAC

Hi MAC

You need to keep the images to a max width of 600 pix. I have gone in and resized the 4 images which were wider than this reducing them to 600 pix wide.

I don't know how you are resizing your images but I used PhotoShop 7 and cropped them to width of 600 pix with a resolution of 1375 pix per inch and then saved the images for the web.

Best,

_________________
Pamela

http://www.tribaltextiles.info
on-line tribal textiles resource

Sorry! My posts are coming out too wide for some reason?

Here are the photos of the Isinai blanket with supp. weft, woven patterns. Although the techniques used are very different the motifs of the two textiles are very similar. In this cloth, what I am guessing is a church, has a different cross on top, the window, the covered entrance and what looks more like a picket fence than a foundation. It also has what looks like steps up to the entrance. Anyone else with ideas?

Perhaps someday we may have an Isinai forum member who can read the motifs correctly for us. Note the fringes which alternate one red one white rather than 3 red and 3 white as in the other ikat cloth.

Best regards, MAC

Here are some photos of Ifugao textiles and their motifs. Textiles from the Ifugao tribal area of Northern Luzon, Philippines, are hard to find. Today, almost everyone wears western clothes and few new textiles are woven. These are primarily aimed at the tourist market.

There has been an attempt to revive the use of the ikat dyeing technique in the Banaue area and textiles with non-traditional motifs or layouts have been produced for the tourist market.

I have been to Ifugao numerous times staying 2 weeks at a time. I always asked and looked for textiles, especially old ones. I only found one old skirt with a lot of damage and 2 or 3 new textiles that I bought for lack of finding anything else. I have textiles from almost every tribal group in the Philippines and in certain cases dozens of pieces from one tribe. Ifugao is near the bottom of the number of pieces list. I have less than ten, mostly new and including two betel nut, shoulder bags. There just aren't many textiles to collect in Ifugao!

The only bright spot on the dark stage of Ifugao textiles are the long, narrow (loincloth like) textiles of spun and woven bark fiber still produced in two or three villages. These were probably originally g-strings for men but are now made for the tourist market. They are still nice, interesting textiles but have only simple, geometric, warp float woven motifs and won't be part of this post.

Basically I want to share Ifugao motifs that relate to the motifs in Warren's textile.

Best Regards, MAC

Hello Warren, thank you for asking my opinion on your . . . . .yes Philippine Ifugao tribe cloth!
Indeed as MAC said there are similar 'blankets' among the Kankanai tribe more on central western side of Luzon and also the Isinai tribe in the middle.
Though the big difference is that the similar looking blankets from those tribes are with WOVEN patterns and yours -from the Ifugao- are with the dificult Ikat method. (Isinai may also be ikat, but their design and used symbols are quite more complicated and they have a center'field')

Your piece is also woven in four 'g-string wide' strokes, indicating the trouble of making this ikattextile.

Among the Ifugao tribe, which are most famous because of their riceteraces and headhunting like most of their neighbouring tribes, the use of Ikat is very restricted to ceremonial pieces related to wedding or death.
I wish I could post some pictures here but still havent master the skill of resizing (each individual) picture.

In the Barcelona Etnological museumcatalogue 'Etnografia de filipinas' (1986) there are two examples of loincloth with ikat; nrs. 119 and 120.

Most blankets one sees of the Ifugao are the so-called 'Bayaong' which are also deathcloth; hung around the deceased to repell bad spirits.

In the last ten years or so I have noticed a revival of the weaving among the tribes, although more among Kalinga. (Perhaps because of the demand Eric Anderson caused with his buying all good and perfect condition textiles!! )
So your textile could be very old and extremely rare or it could be from the later revival.

To conclude; I am 100% sure of it being Ifugao tribe (Luzon, Philippines)and hope to have been of service to you.
Kind regards, Wouter

Just saw also MAC's pics added to this post. >Sorry I kinda 'fell into this topic' and not looking at all the given replies<

Would like to comment on all MAC's posted textiles; as they illustrate quite good waht I already wrote about the different styles among the Kankanai, the Isinai and Ifugaotribe.

MAC's textiles are the Isinai examples. And if you want to know what the symbols mean; they depics the so-called 'begnats' or different farmhouses complete with chickens (those white arrow kinda symbols).
A 'Begnat' is actually a whole family living in one (farm-)house with all animals around and with a fence around. On your blanket you can thus count the number of families/houses; a sort of village map on which one can see the waelth of each family. I suppose on the sides of the blankets are perhaps names of the families or short prayers to the gods.

The Ifugao blanket Mac shows -the darkblue and red- is actually called a 'Gamong' . The Bayaong is similar but has two big white stripes in the middle. The word 'Bayaong' also has a meaning directly to do with death but have forgotten exactly what at this moment.