In the hierarchy of the senses, touch has long struggled for respect.
In academics, reading and writing about textiles seems more important than making them and feeling them.
"Reading" the textile, rather than "feeling" the textile, means that te textile is judged against a value system that is not responsive to its strengths.
"Touch" refers not only to physical contact with a surface - but also in the ways that we are touched, or moved, by our world.
All the above text is by Jessica Hemmings and is from her new book,
The Textile Reader, which I am going through slowly, here at the cottage.
These Irish Rugs were made in the first decades of the 20th century, and were brought to Canada from Ireland in the late 30's by Ned's great grandparents.
They're part of this soulful place and touch me on many levels.
11 comments:
Beautiful rugs. I have never seen anything like them.
They are beautiful! How are they made?
Oh my, those are gorgeous rugs and their colours inspire me. Thank you for the reference to the book!
Judy, can I "borrow" one of the photos to put on the blog of my rug-hooking group (http://hooked-in-london.blogspot.co.uk/), along with a link to this post?
These look like proddy rugs; there's info about how hooked rugs are made here: http://www.northcravenheritage.org.uk/nchtjournal/Journals/1993/J93A17.html
good, strong connection.
Oh these are rugs for bare feet! Wonderful rugs. I'm going to ffollow those links Margaret Cooter offered...curious
past and present become extensions of one another through this heritage of home.
Such wonderful texture and colour in those rugs - but also, surely, little molecules of times gone, nestled into their fabric, connecting with past hands ...
This idea of "touch" is such an important topic. It becomes an issue in some contemporary language theory too--
the separation of self, a wedge gap between experiential knowing and the new theoretical knowing.
How are students to learn to write if they are asked to speak in a pretend voice and take on forms that are so far over their heads/lives. The gap creates issues. Not only in writing voice but in the personality, the creation of consciousness that later enters the population capable of distancing themselves from the tactile world, the feeling self, and thus... politics of what is "marketing" (dont have a word here) arises and people later live the gap, deepen it by accepting it.
these are amazing and the colours still so vibrant after all these years
I am very interested in the kind of surface these rugs have. In fact, I am working myself in a textile made of similar scales. What a coincidence!
http://montsellamas.blogspot.com.es/search/label/jacarand%C3%A1
It is amazing that they are near 100 years old!
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