Touched by Indigo - Royal Ontario Museum
Touched by Indigo - Royal Ontario Museum
Touched by Indigo - Royal Ontario Museum
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aided fringes. To one of the fringes is attached a short and narrow<br />
band woven with a small floral design. It may have served as<br />
a reinforcing tie or a simple decorative element. The pattern of<br />
the much wider ties, bordered <strong>by</strong> dark blue bands with minute<br />
dots, is composed of irregular forms—both characters and<br />
symbols—enclosed in interlocking diamond-shaped frames<br />
of different sizes. They are all arranged diagonally, paralleling<br />
one another. Yet in the haphazard positioning of the forms,<br />
they may be represented facing any direction. Appearing<br />
in blue on white, the characters are all constructed as<br />
angular configurations composed of simple straight lines<br />
or straight lines that make right-angle turns. Some of the<br />
Chinese characters can be easily recognized, but many are<br />
so abstracted and fragmented as to make them impossible to<br />
decipher. If a message is embodied in these characters, it is too<br />
cryptic to understand.<br />
Nevertheless, several characters expressing popular auspicious<br />
wishes, such as fu (good fortune), lu (wealth), shou (longevity), and<br />
the twin form of xi (double happiness), are among the recognizable<br />
ones. Symbols that have been mixed in the jumble include the wan<br />
FH or swastika-like sign, the double open cross, double closed cross,<br />
interlocking arcs, and interlocking lozenges. The wan symbol means<br />
ten thousand and, <strong>by</strong> extension, long life. The symbol made up of two<br />
interlocking lozenges is called fangsheng. It signifies prosperity. The<br />
significance of the rest is ambiguous.<br />
Since the Han dynasty Chinese characters have been woven<br />
into silk, brocade, wool, and cotton.16 Whether they appeared as<br />
single images or as inscriptions, they were always meant to convey<br />
auspicious blessings or admonitions. In the light of this long history,<br />
the jumble of characters we see in the two ties is baffling. Perhaps the<br />
weaver had only minimal education. Yet she saw the attractive potential<br />
in using Chinese characters as a decorative element and the challenge<br />
of using threads to "write" them out in ways that pleased her.<br />
As a rule, such ties are embellished with geometric or<br />
floral motifs.17 This pair, therefore, is quite unique.<br />
THIS SCARF, made of a narrow strip of<br />
unbleached cotton, is woven with sets of three horizontal<br />
lines across the width.18 The sets are spaced<br />
apart at equidistance at both ends, but are spaced<br />
further apart as they progress towards the midsection<br />
to allow for additional bands of patterns.<br />
The patterns are structured <strong>by</strong> interweaving one<br />
set of ground warp with two sets of wefts—with<br />
the ground weft forming the plain weave while<br />
the blue-coloured weft forms the patterns.<br />
No less than twenty-eight patterns are shown<br />
here and only one pattern—a chain pattern—has been repeated<br />
once (the beginning and ending bands are identical). The repertoire<br />
includes simple patterns made up of repeat crosses, wavy lines,<br />
triangles, meanders, lattices, linking trapeziums, as well as more<br />
complex patterns depicting facing ducks, three variations of single file<br />
of dancers holding hands, double files of them represented back to<br />
back, zigzags, the wan motif, eight-point stars, and densely structured<br />
geometric configurations.<br />
This scarf was created <strong>by</strong> a girl or woman of the Miao ethnic<br />
nationality. By exhibiting a great variety of patterns in her work, she<br />
succeeds not only in making this humble head piece look attractive,<br />
but also makes known her knowledge and skill in weaving. In fact,<br />
she may well have used it also as a convenient sampler, unraveling<br />
to interested friends the intricacies of some of the more complex<br />
patterns.<br />
8. SCARF, Cotton, 1980s, Miao ethnic group, Kaili, Guizhou province, GiftofDr. Ka<br />
Bo Tsang in memory of Mrs. Tsang Ng Sheung, 2004.68.7, L. 86.5 cm x W. 24.5 cm<br />
19