Spain, Northern Africa and Owen Jones

The pattern I have made for Spain and Northern Africa is based on the designs of Owen Jones, the eminent Victorian designer, who spent nine years studying the architecture and design of the Alhambra Palace at Granada.

I have also included part of the same thing for a tiny piece of London on the map, which marks both where I live and where the Crystal Palace stood.

Jones was absolutely inspired by the Alhambra. He spoke about it as the 'summit of perfection' and promoted Moorish design and architecture through his seminal work The Grammar of Ornament, as well as by actually building a replica copy of the Alhambra Court at the Crystal Palace, which opened in Sydenham in 1854.

One contemporary visitor described visting the Crystal Palace and seeing 'the Alhambra Court, copied from the ruined Moorish palace of this name at Granada in Spain... [the sight] must strike every eye by the gorgeousness of the colouring, the elaborateness of the ornamentation, and the quaint grace of the architectural style.'




At the heart of the Alhambra Court was a copy of the celebrated Fountain of Lions, a magnificent alabaster basin surrounding by 12 lions in white marble. At Granada, the twelve lions had functioned as a clock with water flowing from a different lion each hour, but the Christians who conquered the city took the clock apart to see how it worked and never managed to put it back together again.




The Alhambra Court at the Crystal Palace was burnt down twice - most disastrously in 1936. This second destruction sealed its fate and it never rose from the ashes again. In 1937, some of Jones mosaics were sold as souvenirs at a garden fete in aid of St Philip's Church at Sydenham and, in 2006, some more were discovered at the back of the Park Ranger's Office.

As for the Moors of Granada, who had created 'this summit of perfection,' and a culture which was as thoroughly Arab and Muslim as Cairo or Damascus, they surrendered to the armies of a Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492. By the end of the 15th century, some 100,000 moriscos had died or been enslaved, 200,000 had emigrated, and 200,000 remained in Castile. Many of the Muslim elite, including Granada's former Emir Muhammad XII, found life under Christian rule intolerable and emigrated to Tlemcen in North Africa.

Genoa, jeans and the Tree of Life

A few weeks ago, I met Roberta Chioni, a weaver who lives in the hills above Genoa. From the garden of the old hunting lodge where she lives and works, you can see forest and sea and smell the pine trees.

Roberta showed me some of weavings and described her work like this:

“Dentro lo schema ortogonale, necessario e rassicurante, di trama e ordito, muovo i fili per sperimentare le infinite variabili di luce e colore offerte dall’intreccio, per intrappolare nella tela frammenti di storia, personale e collettiva. Compongo materiali lontani tra loro – fibre naturali e pellicola cinematografica, merletti e fotocopie, fili metallici e policarbonato – per ricucire legami e lacerazioni. Spesso la creazione esce dal telaio e ricerca dimensioni spaziali monumentali che dialogano con l’ambiente circostante”.


"Within the necessary and reassuring grid of weft and warp, I move the threads - endless fluctuations of light and colours are offered by the way they interlace; I catch fragments of individual and collective history and trap them in the fabric. I combine different materials – natural fibre and film, lace and photocopies, metal wire and polycarbonate sheets – in order to mend broken bonds and rips. The tapestry often spills out of the loom and goes in search of monumental dimensions which converse with the environment."

Roberta also told me how the most quintessential of Genovese patterns, the 'mezzaro' or Tree of Life, arrived in Italy. These hangings or palampores came originally from India in the 17th century, but were soon adapted to local fashion and tastes and were worn as exotic printed headresses by the best-dressed women in town. They wore the pattern growing up into their hair, sprouting wonderful fruit, birds and leaves. On the best mezzari, you can still see the marks from the hair grease of these incredible 18th century coiffures.

The other Genovese cloth story is that of 'gene' - the original denim which was manufactured here in the 15th century as a working men's fabric, as well as a canvas for painting. We were lucky enough to see some of these ghostly paintings in the Cathedral Museum, executed in white on rough blue canvas. They were recently discovered when an old monastery on the outskirts of town was being refurbished as a home for the mentally ill.

In those days, 'gene' was plain woven and dyed as finished cloth in indigo. It was only when production spread to Nimes, that the warp was pre-dyed - producing 'de-Nimes'. The final metamorphosis of denim came in the 19th century, when American mills began weaving the cloth on a drill or diagonal weave in order to make the fabric stronger.

On my map, I've printed a very small mezzaro onto one of my last remaining pieces of indigo cloth and grown it out of the top of Italy.

I also now have my very own Tree of Life, which my friend Silvia bought for me at a very ancient Genovese cloth emporium. I think I will hang my mezzaro in the house so that we can sew life directly onto it. Thank you Silvia xxxx

Many weeks later, I was cycling rather fast down Gipsy Hill when I spotted this 'mezzaro' hanging upside down in a downstairs window.

Map of patterns - Llamas, Alpaca and Lily Schlaen

This is Lily Schlaen. Her grandparents were Jewish migrants from Eastern Europe but she was born in Rosario, Argentina, the birthplace of Che Guevera.

When I asked her if she could help with my map of patterns, she told me about the sweet smell of alpaca wool, it's silkiness, the earthy colours which remind her of home and most of all its warmth.

"The poncho reminds me of feeling the bitter sweet cold of Cordoba's winter....my family had a little house in the mountains....a place between the Earth and the Heavens....nights of starred skies, the smell of orange peels burnt by my father at the open fire.....galloping wild on the neighbours horse, getting lost and given a fright by the mountains bulls...., visiting my Ukrainian violin teacher, who danced Russian style while playing franticallly the czardas on top of the kitchen table, high on the sharp vodka..."

Lily is a musician and has begun, 'Orquestra Sin Fronteras,' an orchestra without any barriers where people of all ages, abilities and nationalities come together to create beautiful sounds and a common purpose - a bit like the musical version of this map of patterns. Her orchestra is already booked to play at the Olympics in 2012! You can watch them perform on YouTube.

Although Lily has lived in England for a long time, whenever she feels homesick, her mother sends her a poncho or a jersey so that she can wrap herself in the warmth and smells and of home.

I've sewed a piece of Lily's precious alpaca jersey onto South America.

Amazingly it carries the same pattern as a picture I found of an ancient Peruvian embroidery - a procession of llamas and steps.

Map of patterns - Kangas, Shirley Ming and Barak Obama

Here is Shirley Ming wearing a beautiful kanga, bearing the motto:

UKILIMA NJIANI SHIKA LAKO

"On the mountain path, stay true to your meaning/path"

Kanga cloths are all about sending messages - they are the equivalent of greeting cards but their message goes a little bit beyond the normal meaning because they incorporate visual imagery and symbols and come alive when they are worn on the body.

I think you can see in Shirleys kanga that the soft, harmonious colours and the blossoming flowers offer happiness to those who follow the message and stay true to their own path in life.

Shirley is very attached to her kanga and I could never have cut it up to use on my map, so I found another on the internet. It commemorates the election of Barak Obama and celebrates this new bond between Africa and America. It's motto reads:

UPENDO NA AMANI AMETUJALIA MUNGA

"God has blessed us with peace and love"

HONGERA BARAK OBAMA

"Good Luck Barak Obama"

Kangas originated on the coast of East Africa in the mid 19th century and on my map I have used my kanga to make the island of Madagascar - you can just see Barak Obamas face peeping out surrounded by black spots.

The spots on the kanga give a clue to its origin: in the beginning kangas were made from
a bolt of spotty handerchief cloth from which single handerkerchiefs were cut off and sold:
ingenious women bought the cloth in lengths of 6 handkerchiefs, then cut the six into two lengths of three, and sewed these together along one side to make 3-by-2 sheet; or bought different kinds of kerchiefs and sewed them back together to make their own unique designs.

The new design was called "leso" after the kerchief squares that had originally been brought to Africa by Portuguese traders. The leso quickly became popular than the other kind of patterned cloth available. Before long, enterprising coastal shopkeepers sent away for special designs, printed like the six-together leso pieces, but as a single unit of cloth.

They are named "Kanga" after the noisy, spotty guinea-fowl bird. Although the kanga design might differ slightly, a typical kanga in East Africa consists of a wider border (Swahili: pindo), the central motif (Swahili: mji), and the writing (Swahili: ujumbe or jina).

These cloths play a very special role in people’s lives, both functional and symbolic, from birth, through courtship and marriage , to old age and death. There is a kanga for every occasion and to convey every shade of meaning.

Wrong side sewing

Here is some sewing I am doing at the moment, inspired by ragbooks and found embroidery.

I am very excited about sewing on one side and then being surprised by what is going on, on the other side when I turn it over.

Sewing simultaneously like this becomes quite an intricate and complex balancing act: the stitch has a prescence on both sides of the cloth - a bit like when a dream comes back vividly to you in the middle of your waking life and penetrates your world suddenly and without any warning - there are several realities existing at the same moment and you're not quite sure which one to follow....

The first two pieces I made for two young boys who died in Gaza during the fighting in 2008. I found this picture of them in the paper - their dead bodies were being carried away by mortuary workers. I studied the details of their clothes and shoes for clues about who they were, but I couldn't find out any more about them - not even their names. They were very beautiful and precious and reminded me of my own boys. I made this so that I wouldn't ever forget them. There is no wrong side or right side.

Map of patterns - Palestine and the impossibility of edges

Here is a picture of me in the West Bank town of Ramallah in 1993. I still have fond memories of my time there and the friends I made.

I've used a piece of indigo-dyed fabric to cover Palestine and Israel and I've embroidered it with a cross stitch pattern copied from a Palestian dress given to me for my 18th birthday.

Palestinian embroiders have a very illustrious history and culture: every region has it's own particular stitches and patterns. The women of Bethlehem area learned the couching stitch from the Crusaders while the women in Jaffa, working in the fields and orchards, used patterns inspired by nature, like the cypress tree. The 'Cypress Tree' occurs in many guises - with or without branches, with different shaped branches, even up side down. (I think you can see this upside down 'Cypress Tree' pattern on my dress)

The women of the villages that remain inside Israel tend to no longer embroider their costumes; but many of the women of the West Bank and Gaza living in refugee camps, especially those of village origin - still embroider their dresses, now as a way of earning an income more than for their own personal use.

The women in Ramallah use a remarkable stitch that is precisely the same when looked at from the front and from the back. You can see from my dress that the work looks very beautiful - even on the wrongside.

I have a great interest in wrongside sewing and am nearly always more interested in 'the back' than in 'the front.' This is because I feel the 'the back' or 'the wrongside' tells me so much more than 'the front' or 'the rightside.'

For example - how the makers fingers travelled, how her mind moved - consciously or unconsciously, where the hidden joins or mends were made...the wrongside gives me clues about how a whole piece of cloth has been divided and then fitted together again and most importantly for me - how the edges have been joined together and made sense of.

This special Ramallah stitch gives nothing away and that is its particular magic.

Map of patterns - Slavery and the price of cotton

The brown fabric is cloth I block printed to show the connections between Europe, Africa and the Caribbean. These kinds of cloths are called Indiennes de Traite or 'trade' cloths and were printed in France towards the end of the 18th century. They were traded with African chiefs for slaves, who were then shipped to the New World, to work and die on sugar and cotton plantations.

The cotton was then shipped back to Europe where it was milled, some of it travelling back to Africa in exchange for more human lives.

Many of the motifs on this cloth were made explicitly to suit the tribal chiefs for whom they were intended - red and black was a particularly popular colour combination.

From Senegal, I discovered an indigo-dyed textile with a circular design still known as 'slave shackles.' I made the sample I have used on the map by tightly folding and stiching cotton cloth before putting it in the dye bath. It is not as vivid as the original, but I have used it to cover parts of West Africa. (You can see it in my first post 'Map of patterns - Wax print and Blaudruk).

The history of cotton and slavery is an open book: the greed for cotton in the 19th century was a bit like our obsessive need for oil. Cotton made fortunes, created empires and was bought at any price. In America itself, the price of a slave actually closely tracked the price of cotton - generally the price of a slave was thought to be 10,000 times the price of cotton.

By the second half of the 19th century slavery was illegal in England, but around 80% of the cotton being processed in British mills was produced by slaves. And the legacy of cotton and slavery lives on: much of the cotton we still wear is produced by impoverished share-croppers and child labourers.

My friend Erica Tate told me how once refused to pay to enter the Tate Gallery, because she considered that her and her slave ancestors were honorary Tates and had already contributed enough. Not far from where Erica lives in Clapham, I found this embroidered island of Jamaica. Although I've covered it with trade cloth, you can still look underneath and see the names and places reclaimed by Jamaicans and lovingly embroidered by this unknown hand.