Watch an excerpt from Teresa Lanceta's evocative video Urdimbre
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The warp is a set of parallel threads through which the weft threads are interwoven to form the fabric. The warp is, has been and will continue to be the focus of the gaze of thousands of people all over the world.
The warps are repetitive and static, and oblige the weaver to adopt the same posture, to perform the same gesture and to be in the same place, an excessive stillness which, on occasion, gives the weaver an inner freedom capable of moving what is stopped and of creating culture and art.
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Teresa Lanceta, Urdimbre, 2008, photograph
If you are looking for a reliable and free source for research on fabrics, colours, techniques and fibres, we recommend The Maiwa School of Textiles. Born in 2004, Maiwa School seeks to promote traditional techniques from around the world and to encourage local makers and craftspeople. At this link you will find a series of free lessons and documentaries: https://maiwa.teachable.com/p/free-lessons
Listen to the last May Beattie Lecture, Celebrating a modest radical, given by Dorothy Armostrong, May Beattie Visiting Fellow in Carpet Studies!
Access Passcode: ons#d244
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The Ashmolean's May Beattie Archive is a treasury of stories about the history and cultural importance of Asian rugs, revealed through Dr Beattie's life in carpets. One such story is her involvement with the ambitious 1976 World of Islam Festival held in the UK. Under the Festival's umbrella, Dr Beattie curated one of the most significant carpet exhibitions of the 20th century titled 'Carpets of Central Persia'. In this year's annual May Beattie lecture, Dorothy Armstrong talks more about Beattie's carpet findings presented in her 1976 Sheffield exhibition - described as 'one of the greatest contributions to rug studies'.
Listen to the lecture Mrs. Beattie and Mr. Getty: A Carpet Controversy, given by Dr. Dorothy Armstrong.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlbqB-4XUks
In 1969, May Beattie, a British carpet scholar with no academic affiliation, working from her home in the provincial city of Sheffield, UK, was invited by John Paul Getty, one of the world’s richest men, to catalogue his growing collection of carpets. In the following months, the two strong personalities went head-to-head over their provenance. This quarrel had a direct effect on the collecting practices of what became the world’s richest arts institution, The Getty Museum, and has left open questions about a set of Persian and Indo-Persian carpets.
Listen to the podcast A Knotted Pile Carpet from Lahore Central Jail, c.1880, part of the series Empire Lines: A Podcast Series Exploring colonialism through Objects.
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Dr Dorothy Armstrong explores what a carpet woven in Lahore Central Jail around 1880 can tell us about British colonial efforts to control Indian material culture.
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