Fortunately, Japan's bamboo and rice-paper buildings didn't burn too long.Īll of the rare and wonderful fabrics in the show were selected from the collection of the Seattle Art Museum, and most have never been on public exhibition. Some of the firefighters wore more practical leather coats the others soaked their cloth coats in water on the way to a blaze. Curator William Rathbun explains that the fancy coats were worn by samurai, Japan's first organized firefighters (1629), but he doesn't tell us what rabbits and tigers have to do with it. Some are plain quilted cotton, but others are exuberantly emblazoned with tigers and giant rabbits. Pride in their craft fairly bubbles from a series of firemen's coats. Unbleached, undyed, simply sewn and undecorated save for a solid blue border, it obviously was made by a woman of skill and taste, for a man with substantial and valuable work to do. In fact the outstanding garment of the collection may be a severely plain, dun-colored work coat woven of mountain wisteria fiber. There could be no better evidence of the dignity of labor than the exhibit's examples of practical but beautifully made sled-hauling vests and farmers' coats. Most of the 75 pieces in the show were made by and for "commoners," and many of them are work clothes. The exhibit emphasizes how intimately what people wear reveals not only custom and status but how they feel about themselves. It is certainly true that there is a clear continuum of design from the Ainu to the "mainstream" Japanese fabrics that make up the bulk of the exhibition. While their magic didn't do much to save the Ainu, it is comforting to think that their handsome textiles and harmonious traditions may have had a refining and gentling influence on their successors. Decorations were symmetrical, seeking balance, and magical designs were used at openings, hems, sleeves and back to ward off evil spirits. The seemingly rude materials were often transmuted into cloth of astonishing fineness and delicacy. Using simple backstrap looms, Ainu women fashioned graceful garments and durable work clothes from such fibers as mulberry, nettles, jute, hemp, flax, rose mallow, daphne, wisteria, arrowroot, agave, elm and linden. Their descendants, like America's Indians and Australia's Aborigines, struggle to maintain traditions and a sense of identity.Ī strong flavor of the Ainu attitude persists in fabrics the women wove, ancient examples of which introduce an enchanting exhibition of Japanese folk weavings at Washington's Textile Museum. Despised as the "hairy Ainu" by the fierce newcomers, they yielded ground and latitude until, by the 12th century, the survivors were corraled on Hokkaido, northernmost of Japan's main islands. Such a people had little chance of withstanding the onslaught on their homeland by invaders from the Asian mainland. Afterward they would thank the tree spirit for sharing. These aboriginal inhabitants of Japan were so in harmony with nature that they'd peel only half a tree to get fiber for weaving, leaving plenty of bark and cambium for healing and continued growth. THE AINU were too gentle for their own good.
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