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Ceremonial Textile

late 14th century -15th century (made)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

This cotton ceremonial cloth has a design of a woman carrying a parrot with female attendants holding an umbrella. The design is repeated over two registers. The motifs mimic those seen in western Indian manuscript painting of the period 1400-1500 and earlier. Radiocarbon-14 dating of the cloth has confirmed a date in this range.

This cloth was produced in Gujarat, western India, but was collected in the Toraja area of central Sulawesi. Here, cloths like this one served as banner hangings and stage-set backdrops for ceremonies, especially harvest festivals and celebrations of rites of passage.


Object details

Categories
Object type
Materials and techniques
Cotton, block-printed.
Brief description
Ceremonial textile. Gujarat for the Indonesian market.
Dimensions
  • Width: 98cm
  • Length: 503cm
Production typeUnique
Credit line
Purchased with Art Fund support
Object history
Ceremonial cloth with a design of woman carying a parrot and with female attendants holding an umbrella. The design is repeated over two registers. The motifs mimmick those seen in western Indian manuscript painting of the15th century and earlier. Radiocarbon 14 dating has confirmed a date in this range. This cloth was produced in Gujarat, western India, and collected in the Toraja area of central Sulawesi, where such items served as banner hangings and stage-set backdrops for ceremonies, especially harvest ferstivals and the rites of passage celebrations.
Summary
This cotton ceremonial cloth has a design of a woman carrying a parrot with female attendants holding an umbrella. The design is repeated over two registers. The motifs mimic those seen in western Indian manuscript painting of the period 1400-1500 and earlier. Radiocarbon-14 dating of the cloth has confirmed a date in this range.

This cloth was produced in Gujarat, western India, but was collected in the Toraja area of central Sulawesi. Here, cloths like this one served as banner hangings and stage-set backdrops for ceremonies, especially harvest festivals and celebrations of rites of passage.
Bibliographic reference
John Guy, Woven Cargoes, Indian Textiles in the east, Thames and Hudson, 1996, pl. 146.
Collection
Accession number
IS.95-1993

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Record createdJanuary 19, 2000
Record URL
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