Making Kantha, Making Home

Making Kantha, Making Home
Author: Pika Ghosh
Publisher: University of Washington Press
Total Pages: 275
Release: 2020-07-15
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0295747005

In Bengal, mothers swaddle their infants and cover their beds in colorful textiles that are passed down through generations. They create these kantha from layers of soft, recycled fabric strengthened with running stitches and use them as shawls, covers, and seating mats. Making Kantha, Making Home explores the social worlds shaped by the Bengali kantha that survive from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In the first study of colonial-period women’s embroidery that situates these objects historically and socially, Pika Ghosh brings technique and aesthetic choices into discussion with iconography and regional culture. Ghosh uses ethnographic and archival research, inscriptions, and images to locate embroiderers’ work within domestic networks and to show how imagery from poetry, drama, prints, and watercolors expresses kantha artists’ visual literacy. Affinities with older textile practices include the region’s lucrative maritime trade in embroideries with Europe, Africa, and China. This appraisal of individual objects alongside the people and stories behind the objects’ creation elevates kantha beyond consideration as mere handcraft to recognition as art.

Wise Craft Quilts

Wise Craft Quilts
Author: Blair Stocker
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
Total Pages: 194
Release: 2017-03-14
Genre: Crafts & Hobbies
ISBN: 1611803489

Infuse your quilts with love--how to add your personal story and more meaning to your handmade quilts. In Wise Craft Quilts, celebrated quilt designer and crafter Blair Stocker shares ways to use cherished fabrics to make quilts with more meaning. Each of the twenty-one quilts featured here gathers a special collection of fabric, outlines a new technique, and spins a story. By using special fabrics as the starting point for each project—from a wedding dress to baby’s first clothes, worn denim, Tyvek race numbers, and more—the finished quilt is made even more special. Create quilts that have a story to tell and you’ll find a whole new level of appreciation for what they represent in your life and the lives of the ones you love.

Kantha

Kantha
Author: Ekta Kaul
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 193
Release: 2024-06-20
Genre: Crafts & Hobbies
ISBN: 1789940915

A beautiful book on the tradition of kantha, a Bengali embroidery technique with a rich heritage rooted in storytelling and upcycling, with inspiration and techniques for contemporary makers. The word 'kantha' refers to both the style of running stitch, as well as the finished cloth: quilted textiles made from multiple layers of cast-off cloth, traditionally embroidered with threads pulled out from the borders of old saris and dhotis. These beautiful fabrics were created exclusively by women in the Bengal region of the Indian subcontinent. In this richly illustrated book, textile artist Ekta Kaul explores the history of the kantha tradition and finds objects of extraordinary beauty. She goes on to look at how the kantha spirit is inspiring artists today and discusses creative techniques to help you develop your own interpretations, alongside a dictionary of fundamental kantha stitches with supporting images and instructions. Steeped in the ethos of sustainability, emotional repair and mindful making, kantha will lead you to uncover a slower and more thoughtful approach to stitching.

Kantha

Kantha
Author: Darielle Mason
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 308
Release: 2009
Genre: Antiques & Collectibles
ISBN:

This first book-length study on kanthas published outside of South Asia focuses on two premier collections, one assembled by the legendary historian of Indian art, Dr. Stella Kramrisch, the other by Jill and Sheldon Bonovitz, leading proponents of self-taught art. Created from worn-out garments imaginatively embroidered by women with motifs and tales drawn from a rich regional repertoire, kanthas traditionally were stitched as gifts for births, weddings, and other family occasions. Innovative essays by leading scholars explore the domestic, ritual, and historical contexts of the fascinating quilts in these collections--made between the mid-19th and mid-20th century in what is today Bangladesh and West Bengal, India--and trace their reinterpretation as emblems of national identity and works of art.

Inspiration Kantha

Inspiration Kantha
Author: Anna Hergert
Publisher: Schiffer Publishing
Total Pages: 112
Release: 2017-08-28
Genre: Embroidery
ISBN: 9780764353574

"This guide leads you through the layering of fabrics, the choices of imagery, and the stitching itself. There are handy motif patterns, instructions on how to begin a personal kantha reference library, and more. Both simple and complex projects help you get started, whether you're a beginner or an expert stitcher. A colorful gallery of kantha work is included to inspire you."--Back cover.

Animal Fair

Animal Fair
Author: Sharmila Kantha
Publisher: Children's Book Trust
Total Pages: 20
Release: 2000
Genre: Children's stories, Indic (English)
ISBN: 9788170118732

A Boy And His Father Go Shopping For Animals. Their Expedition Not Only Builds Up A Big Farm For Them, It Also Proves To Be A Learning Experience! A Delightful Book, With Delightful Pictures. The Little Ones Will Love It!

Puer Tea

Puer Tea
Author: Jinghong Zhang
Publisher: University of Washington Press
Total Pages: 264
Release: 2013-12-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0295804874

Puer tea has been grown for centuries in the “Six Great Tea Mountains” of Yunnan Province, and in imperial China it was a prized commodity, traded to Tibet by horse or mule caravan via the so-called Tea Horse Road and presented as tribute to the emperor in Beijing. In the 1990s, as the tea’s noble lineage and unique process of aging and fermentation were rediscovered, it achieved cult status both in China and internationally. The tea became a favorite among urban connoisseurs who analyzed it in language comparable to that used in wine appreciation and paid skyrocketing prices. In 2007, however, local events and the international economic crisis caused the Puer market to collapse. Puer Tea traces the rise, climax, and crash of this phenomenon. With ethnographic attention to the spaces in which Puer tea is harvested, processed, traded, and consumed, anthropologist Jinghong Zhang constructs a vivid account of the transformation of a cottage handicraft into a major industry—with predictable risks and unexpected consequences. Watch the associated videos at https://archive.org/details/PUERTEADVD1.

Aboriginal Screen-printed Textiles from Australia's Top End

Aboriginal Screen-printed Textiles from Australia's Top End
Author: Joanna Barrkman
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2020
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780998044507

Tiwi Design : screen-printing textiles for fifty years / Nadine Lee and Joanna Barrkamn -- Merrepen Arts, Culture and Language Corporation : floods of crativity / Cathy Laudenbach -- Mantra Pandanas project / Bobbie Ruben.

Textiles in Burman Culture

Textiles in Burman Culture
Author: Sylvia Fraser-Lu
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2021
Genre: Design
ISBN: 9786162151637

This pioneering work traces the history and evolution of the textiles of Myanmar (Burma) made and used by the Burman (Bama) ethnic majority. Written accessibly, it covers the importance of textiles in many contexts as well as changes and innovation brought about by trade and conflict with neighboring states, British colonization, postwar isolation, and recent "open-door" policies. In addition to visiting the major textile centers, Sylvia Fraser-Lu ventured into the more remote areas of the Burman heartland to garner information on lesser-known textiles and those made by minorities. Profusely illustrated with on-site and archival photographs of weavers and heirloom textiles, as well as with diagrams and sketches, this book will be an important reference for textile scholars and art historians and for those interested in Burman culture.