View from the FringeNewsletter of the New England Rug Society

Vol. XI, No. 2 November 1, 2003 www.ne-rugsociety.org

Next Meeting:Peter Stone on the Development of Tribal and Workshop Design Motifs

Next Meeting DetailsDate: Friday, November 14

Time: 7 PM. Please note early start!

Place: Skinner, Heritage on the Park,

63 Park Plaza, Boston, MA

Pkng: Street and neighboring lots and garages

Rug motifs vary and devolve over time in mov-ing between urban centers, villages and tribes. Theyalso change in moving between generations of weav-ers. In this talk, Pete Stone explores and illustratesthis variation. He presents generalizations describ-ing the variation and devolution of tribal and villagepile rug motifs of the 19th and early 20th centuries.This lecture promises to infuse reason and factualinformation into a field that is often beset by merespeculation.

Pete is a former President of the Chicago RugSociety. He has occupied the last four years of hisretirement with research and work on a book entitledTribal and Village Rug Motifs to be published in 2004by Thames & Hudson. This talk is based, in part, onhis research for this book.

Pete first became involved with oriental rugsin 1978 when he purchased a Caucasian rug badly inneed of repair. Since the cost of repairs was pro-hibitive, he decided to learn rug repair and do thework himself. Although he never completed repairs

on this first acquisition, he was inspired to write awidely respected book on the subject, Oriental RugRepair. He has been a student of oriental rugs eversince. A tangible result of his studies is the publica-tion of his book Oriental Rugs Lexicon, an indis-pensable component of every rug enthusiast’s library.He is also the author of Rugs of the Caucasus: Struc-ture and Design.

Attendees who arrive early will be able to pre-view the rugs that will be auctioned off in the fol-lowing day’s Skinner sale.

September Meeting:John Collins Exhibition and Lecture on South Persian Tribal Rugs

By Jim AdelsonOn September 21, John Collins kicked off this

year’s NERS season with a session that he gener-ously hosted and led in his Newburyport gallery.Mark Hopkins introduced John as, among otherthings, “a mainstay of support for NERS from thevery beginning.” And John has been a passionatestudent of the meeting’s topic—Khamseh, Qashqa’i,and Afshar weaving—for even longer. For his talk,John had put many pieces up on display in the gal-lery, including many from his current inventory andsome that he persuaded local collectors to lend backfor the exhibit. As part of the event, John had pro-duced and distributed for attendees a spiral-bound

set of notes on the Afshar with about 60 high-qualitycolor illustrations—another element that made thisan excellent meeting.

John started his session with a briefethnohistoric introduction to the three “tribes.” TheKhamseh take their name from the Persian word for“five,” so designated because the Khamseh Federa-tion was formed from five different tribes in the1860s by the then Shah. The Shah was motivated byhis desire to counterbalance the Qashqa’i who wereboth powerful and resentful of central authority.

The Afshar and Qashqa’i are also mixtures ofContinued on page 2

Report on October meeting coming up in next issue

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September Meeting:John Collins Exhibition and Lecture on South Persian Tribal Rugs

diverse peoples, though less frequently referred toas federations. The Afshar are the most varied, withboth Arab and Turkic peoples in the group. In turn,Afshars intermarried with Persian villagers, who thenlabelled themselves Afshars, leading to an even moreheterogeneous tribe. The Afshars, like the othertribes, were sometimes forcibly moved around withinthe country as part of government efforts to controltheir power or balance that of other groups.

While the Afshar are the most diverse ethni-cally, their weaving has the most structural consis-tency. Afshar weavers usually use ivory woolenwarps and two-shoot wefts, typically colored orangeor red. They lavish attention on the end finisheswhich take many different forms, starting from asimple, though rare, plain red kilim. Moving up onelevel from this most basic end finish is the use ofextra weft designs to decorate the kilim ends. Fan-cier pieces have a lengthier kilim end done in astriped pattern or supplementary weft design (in con-trast to the Qashqa’i, who sometimes use comple-mentary weft brocade). Some pieces use twiningtechniques, and some have so much end finish deco-ration that an entire end panel gets created for it.The warps themselves are sometimes handled deco-ratively, with groups of warps twined together intolong braids. Some pieces combine several of theseend treatments: John showed an example with twillfinish and with supplementary weft through themiddle of the end finish as well. These end finishesare not only very decorative—they’re also very du-rable.

Afshar weavings have other known variations.Afshars use one of several side finishes, from thesimplest with two groups of warps wrapped in red,to blocks of color in the warp wrapping—sometimeswith random size and choice of color, and other timeswith two colors alternating. Afshars most frequentlyuse the symmetric knot, although there are exampleswith asymmetric knotting. Most pieces are wovenwith a knot count between 80 and 120 knots persquare inch, though there are some more finely wo-

ven examples that get to 150 kpsi or even higher.John pointed out that many Afshar designs have

an urban basis. The boteh, the vase, and other popu-lar Afshar designs were used in Persian city weav-

Afshar rug, third quarter 19th C, 6’x13’

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September Meeting:John Collins Exhibition and Lecture on South Persian Tribal Rugs

ing. But not all of the design vocabulary comes froman urban setting.

The ethnic heritage of the Afshars also affectedtheir choice of weaving format. From their Turkicbackground, the Afshars wove a lot of pieces in thechuval (rectangular bag) format, while other SouthPersian tribes concentrated more heavily on thekhorjin (square bag) format. John also talked abouta puzzling small square format, approximately threefeet by three feet; these pieces are typically morefinely woven. He indicated that he’d been research-ing, discussing, and speculating about the purposeof this format for some time, including one hypoth-esis that these pieces were sofrehs (eating cloths),but very fine pile didn’t seem a logical choice forsuch a use. According to John, at a recent ACORconference the Persian author and scholar Parviz

Khamseh rug, ca 1870, 5’-6”x10’-8”

Tanavoli said that, from his research, these pieceswere used as seat carpets for distinguished guests.

John moved on to a similar summary ofKhamseh weaving. Khamseh pieces are usuallywoven on dark woolen warps (where the Qashqa’iusually used ivory woolen warps). Most Khamsehpieces are symmetrically knotted with wool weftsthat are brown or brown and dark red. Checkerboardpatterns are commonly used in the end finishes. Thedesign vocabulary also draws on urban motifs, suchas botehs and floral medallions. The designs can beparticularly sophisticated, such as feathered botehsevolved from Kerman shawl designs, or the so-called“dragon island” boteh example on one wall in thegallery. Main carpets were fairly uncommon amongthe Khamseh. John observed that those main car-pets must have been made for special purposes orcommissions, because the quality of the main car-pets is “pretty good” at the very least, and some arespectacular.

Turning tothe Qashqa’i, Johnstarted by describ-ing their weavingas “probably thefanciest produc-tion of all theSouth Persian ...probably related tothe fact that theyare so wealthy.”Qashqa’i piecesare typically asym-metrically knotted.The foundation issometimes silk,but mostly withwarps of ivorywool and weftswith two shoots ofred wool. Check-

Continued from page 2

Continued on page 4Qashqa’i rug, ca 1890, 4’-2”x5’-8”

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September Meeting:John Collins Exhibition and Lecture on South Persian Tribal Rugs

erboard end finishes, either pile or non-pile, are fairlycommon. The design vocabulary is also sometimeson the fancy side, with the millefleur design, knownfrom Mughal weaving, being one such example.

Lest our impressions be dominated by urban de-signs, John also took us through a number of tribalelements in the weaving of these three groups. Forthe Afshars, a gabbeh influence is sometimes present.John illustrated this point by means of an examplewith an open, camel-ground field, with a few de-vices, including botehs, floating in the space. Thisrug had a complex and varied set of end finishes withmultiple stripes of kilim, complementary weft work,and braiding (see picture at right).

On the tribal side of Khamseh weaving, Johnpresented a beautiful piece with many birds and pea-cocks. The piece had a number of Qashqa’i designelements, but the structure was classic Khamseh—dark warps, paired brown and red wefts. The piecehad colorful open half-diamonds at the edge of thefield, and four thin, single-color lines of border. Johnobserved that by the time you get to 1900, theKhamseh weavings have less variation and a moreamalgamated style, while the older pieces have morevariation, and also more resemblance to Qashqa’iweaving.

John also highlighted the Khamseh love ofstripes. The Khamseh used vertical stripes predomi-nantly, with horizontal stripes only for borders thatappear in both the vertical and horizontal dimensions.The Khamseh delighted in filling the stripes withtheir favorite border designs. In some cases, thestripes occupy the entire field; sometimes the weaverbrings out the three-dimensionality by “floating” amedallion or other elements on top of the stripes (fora great example, John referred to James Opie’s bookTribal Rugs, plate 11.14, found on page 205).

The more tribal side of Qashqa’i weaving com-bined some of the elements found in Khamseh weav-ing with the products of Qashqa’i prosperity. Thedesign repertoire shares several aspects with the

Afshar rug, ca 1900, 4’-2”x5’-10”

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Khamseh, including the extensive use of borders,even to the point where the main field is completelyfilled with border motifs. Silk, too, appears in theserugs, sometimes in the foundation materials, andsometimes in silk flowers in the field.

After John completed his remarks, the attend-ees milled around the gallery, examining pieces, talk-ing, and prolonging the enjoyment. Ruggies inter-ested in seeing more of these fascinating weavingsshould visit the Collins Gallery (for further informa-tion call 978-462-7276, e-mail info@bijar.com, orvisit website www.bijar.com).

Our sincere thanks to John for organizing, pre-paring, and delivering this great start to the NERS2003-2004 season!

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The Washington ICOCEditor’s note: because of lack of space in the

previous newsletter this report is being printed now.The Tenth International Conference on Oriental Rugstook place in Washington DC on April 17-21 2003.

Textile art of Southwest Persia, an exhibit atICOC. The ICOC in Washington included at leastnine special textile exhibits. Most of the exhibitssurveyed a specific textile area and displayed repre-sentative pieces, many of which were very memo-rable. One exhibit, The Textile Art of SouthwestPersia, curated by John Wertime and Wendel Swan,was a comprehensive survey of the weavings of thatarea. The sixty exceptional pieces ranged from somevery early Southwest Persian rugs to gabbehs, bags,horse covers, animal bands, trappings, and kilims.Among the design elements were very early flowerpatterns that were reminiscent of Mughal patterns,rugs with people and animals, colorful latch-hookdiamonds, and many variations of botehs.

Pieces that left lasting memories were aKhamseh pile saddle piece with two chickens on adark blue background in an unusual prayer rug for-mat; a Lori soumak bagface with rows of very ar-chaic looking horses in red and blue wool; a marvel-ous Khamseh pile carpet with mother and childbotehs on a white ground; a Bakhtiari kilim with themain border of thirteen unique panels on each sideshowing the Bakhtiari design vocabulary of animals,people, and geometric figures; a splendid very earlypile rug with a center medallion with pendants sur-rounded by rows of flowering plants; and a Qashqa’iflatwoven chuval whose kilim was sprinkled withcolorful latchhook diamonds.

We had seen about half of the pieces in earlierexhibits or illustrated in rug books. Yet it was a plea-sure to revisit these great weavings again as well assee others for the first time. Seeing this exhibit issimilar to attending ICOC—it was fun to see oldfriends again and to meet others for the first time.

Ann NicholasICOC Impressions. The ICOC took place in

Washington during cherry blossom time; theconference’s events thus had tough competition fromnature’s bounty. The proximity of Washington’s zoo

with its famous pandas also proved to be a distrac-tion. Nonetheless, I managed to visit most of theaccompanying exhibitions (many, many beautifulrugs!), meet in person various people whom I hadknown only as contributors to on-line forums, attendthe reception at the Uzbek embassy (many beautifulsuzanis!) and meet the ambassadors of Uzbekistanand Turkmenistan, covet various pieces on sale atthe Carpet Fair, attend a few lectures, and even de-liver my own (on design irregularities in Turkmenrugs, what else?). Many of the speakers sufferedfrom malfunctioning projection equipment. One ofthe main things to be learned from the conference isthat slide shows will soon be history and Power Pointwill rule the world.

Of the talks that I heard, the one that stands outin my mind was delivered by Jürg Rageth of Swit-zerland. His title was Radiocarbon Dating in Ori-ental Carpet and Textile Studies, but he confined him-self to the story of the famous dragon and phoenixfragments including one that surfaced recently andwas accepted as genuine by all experts. Carbon dat-ing has confirmed the earlier ones as originating inthe 14-16th centuries, but the last one was dated tothe 1700-2000 (or something like that) period. Sub-sequent analysis has shown that its dyes are all syn-thetic! So much for the experts. Another talk thatleft an impression was Peter Bichler’s Textiles andRugs on Etruscan Murals, 800-350 BC. It made meresolve to visit at the earliest opportunity the Italiansites where these wonderful murals are found!

Yon BardPost-ICOC NYC Tour. After the ICOC in

Washington, the Hajji Baba Club of New York hosteda two day extension of the conference. The DC ICOCwas jam-packed with events, but NY was a whirl-wind!

On Monday, April 21, most people attendingwere at The Roger Williams Hotel on Madison Aveat 31st St. in the rug district. Our first event washeld that evening at the Gail Martin Gallery, 310Riverside Drive at 103rd St. This textile gallery hadso many beautiful forms of textile art on the walls

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NERS Member Mini-ProfilesBy Ann Nicholas

Editor’s note: with this article Ann Nicholas inau-gurates a new feature: brief interviews with NERSmembers, especially relatively new ones. We thankEd Berkhoff for the accompanying pictures.

Ed BerkhoffI have many interests, most notably rug collecting! Ilive in Cambridge. To make enough money to buyrugs I work as a medical writer for thebiopharmaceutical industry (Biogen in KendallSquare).How do you characterize your involvement inrugs/textiles?I am a collector, not so much a pile-kicker but defi-nitely a rug flipper!What kinds of rugs/textiles are you most interestedin? What is it about them that appeal to you?I collect Baluch pieces. I suppose it’s the simplicityof design and overall penumbral look that attractsme most to these rugs, although I have recently beenseeking out those rare and beautiful colorfulBaluchis. I have recently also begun to focus on

Baluch rugs utilizing the boteh design, mostly be-cause I love the design. However, I am fascinatedby how this urban design “infiltrated” the Baluchnomads; and also how they interpreted it.How did you first get interested in them?About ten years ago I entered a rug shop for the firsttime. Before that I had never even looked at rugs. Ibought a modern production Afghan rug that day andthe rest is history.What brought you to the Rug Society and howlong have you been a member?I moved to Massachusetts four years ago and imme-diately looked up the local rug club since I had beena member of the Triangle Rug Society in North Caro-lina prior to moving here.How has being a member influenced you?Meeting so many knowledgeable people. I havelearned so much and my collector’s eye has improvedso much since joining. Basically, I have become amore discerning collector by joining this group.

Lloyd KannenbergI am a physicist on the faculty of the University ofMassachusetts, Lowell Campus. Besides teachingand theoretical research, I enjoy studying the historyof physics and mathematics.Interviewer’s note: Lloyd’s wife, Susan, often attendsour meetings. Her interest is in beautiful and usefultextiles–notably quilts.How do you characterize your involvement inrugs/textiles?You could characterize me as an “enthusiast and ac-cumulator,” but on a pretty small scale.What kinds of rugs/textiles are you most interestedin? What is it about them that appeals to you?I started with Caucasian rugs, but have widened ho-rizons a bit, with a couple of Anatolian pieces and afew bags and bag faces.How did you first get interested in them?I was on an exchange with Tbilisi State University

Ed BerkhoffContinued on page 7

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NERS Member Mini-Profiles

in (then Soviet) Georgia in 1980, saw beautiful thingsthere, and also while on a “komandirovka” toAshkabad, Tashkent, and Samarkand. We visited thecarpet factory in Ashkabad, and also noted that theLenin Monument there (every Soviet city had a LeninMonument) was decorated with ceramic tile repre-sentations of Tekke carpets!What brought you to the Rug Society and howlong have you been a member?I heard about NERS when at the MFA for some eventabout five years ago, and after searching a bit foundout how to contact Mark. So it’s really his fault thatwe became members! We had gone to a couple of“events” at Gregorian Oriental Rugs, but althoughthese were enjoyable, they really didn’t have enoughsubstance to satisfy my interest.How has being a member influenced you?Physics is a left-brain activity. Being an NERS mem-ber stimulates what’s left of my right brain! And ofcourse I have learned a lot and met some really greatpeople. Lloyd Kannenberg

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The Washington ICOC

ranging from very, very antique to contemporary. Anamazing evening!

Tuesday morning our first destination was theHispanic Society Museum where we saw Hispano-Moresque carpets. The tour was led by Europeanrug expert Sally Sherrill. From there we drove infour buses to Sotheby’s for a viewing of Marilyn andMarshall Wolf’s special collection of Central AsianEmbroideries. The exhibit was beautifully hung andvery well lit. A delicious buffet lunch at Sotheby’swas provided by the Wolfs for the over 160 attend-ees.

Then off to the Met (Metropolitan Museum ofArt) where we were able to view Mughal and otherrare rugs from the Frick Museum. The tour contin-ued to the Ratti Conservation Department to viewmore rugs and conservation techniques.

In the evening the Hajji Baba Club Gala Din-ner was held at the National Arts Club on Gramercy

Park. Rugs from club members were hanging ev-erywhere, and dinner was elegant and delicious.

On Wednesday, the final day, we were off tothe Brooklyn Art Museum where we saw many rarelyseen rugs in an exhibition presented by curator AimeeFroom, Amy Poster, and Dr. Walter Denny. In theafternoon it was on to Soho where we first visitedIvelisse & Conan Brooks’ Antiquarius Gallery to viewtheir own Baluch collection. We walked across thestreet to the new Mark Shilen Gallery to view yetanother exhibition. This time it was classic Turkmenmain rugs from the Munkacsi collection. Markserved us much food and drink provided again bythe Hajji Baba Club.

This addendum to the conference was definitelyvery exciting! The Hajjis were generous beyond be-lief. The NY portion of the conference ran like clock-work with barely a glitch.

Kudos to all involved!!!!Rosalie and Mitch Rudnick

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Josephine Powell Kilims Exhibition in IstanbulBy Ronald and Selma Newburgh

While in Istanbul recently, we noticed severalarticles in the Turkish newspapers on an exhibit ofAnatolian kilims in early September. To our delightthe exhibit was of some 40 kilims donated to Turkeyby Josephine Powell (see the September NERS news-letter).

The collection is truly staggering, both visuallyand aesthetically. The kilims were shown in threerooms, arranged according to their region of origin—western, central, and eastern Anatolia. The old ruleof Turkish weaving was very evident: as one goeseast in Anatolia, the palette goes from lighter todeeper, more intense colors. (Compare a Bergamaor Milas with a Kurdish piece from Kars.) All thepieces were well displayed, mounted on boards, andlabeled intelligently in Turkish and English with in-formation about their structure. There were so manypieces that it is difficult to single out any. However,two Yüncüs with their strong graphics in blue andred and a classic Malatya stay in mind.

The exhibit did more than just show the kilims.

In two of the rooms they had placed actual blackgoat wool nomadic tents and in the third a yurt. Theirwalls were covered with kilims, showing their useagainst wind and cold. Stuffed kilim chuvals werescattered about, so that one saw the kilim as a utili-tarian object. The exhibit thus went beyond present-ing the kilims as aesthetic objects, out of context.Their importance as household objects, essential tonomadic life, was stressed as well. That everydayobjects are made with such beauty says much abouttheir creators.

As a footnote let us describe the site of the ex-hibit. It was in the Darp-hane, the imperial Ottomanmint, situated in the Topkapi complex between theArchaeological Museum and the church of St. Irene.The rooms still contain some of the machines usedfor coining that were imported from Birmingham,England, for the Ottoman monetary reform of 1844under Sultan Abdul Mejid. As a background the oldmint is quite charming.

The New England Rug Society is an infor-mal, non-profit organization of people interestedin enriching their knowledge and appreciation ofantique oriental rugs and textiles. Its meetings areheld six to eight times a year. Annual membershipdues are: Single $45, Couple $65, Supporting $90,Patron $120. Membership information or renewalforms can be obtained on our website www.ne-rugsociety.org, or by writing to New England RugSociety, P.O. Box 582, Lincoln, MA 01773, call-ing Mark Hopkins at 781-259-9444, or emailinghim at mopkins@netway.com.

NERS 2003/4 Steering Committee:Mark Hopkins (President)

Jim AdelsonRobert AlimiJulia Bailey

Yonathan BardJohn Clift

Tom HannaherGillian Richardson

Janet SmithJeff Spurr

NERS NewsNew members. We welcome the following

additions to our roster: Forrest & Julie Forsythe,Tom & Peggy Simons, Lynn & Peter Smiledge, andEdward Stanley.

NERS on-line bag exhibition. At this time thepieces to be included in the exhibition have been

selected and photographed, and their structures havebeen analyzed. The introductory essay and many ofthe plate descriptions remain to be written and puton the website. We hope to launch the exhibition bymid December. We’ll send out an e-mail notice whenit’s ready.

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Upcoming Rug EventsNERS 2003/4 Meetings:February 20, 2004: Seref Ozen on Central Asianrugs and textilesMarch 19: Harald Böhmer on the nomads ofAnatolia and their weavingsApril 16: Jim Adelson and Yon Bard on TurkmenweavingsMay 22: Picnic and show & tell.

Auctions:Bonhams & Butterfields, San Francisco, 12/17Christie’s, New York, 12/17Nagel, Stuttgart, 11/4Rippon Boswell, Wiesbaden, 11/15Skinner, Boston, 11/15Sotheby’s, New York, 12/2.

Conferences:ACOR 7, Seattle, WA, 3/25-28/04. All NERS mem-bers should have received their information bro-chures and registration forms by now. This prom-ises to be the greatest ACOR ever, so send in yourregistration soon—before the conference is filled up!For more information, visit www.acor-rugs.org (youcan register on-line, too), or fax your questions to317-635-4757.Seminar on Central Asian Rugs & Textiles withElena Tsareva and Tom Cole, 2/17-18/04 in SanFrancisco, immediately following the Tribal ArtsShow (see below). Elena will discuss the languageof the Turkmen weavers as it was passed down fromculture to culture. She will also discuss new dataon Pazyryk textiles. Tom Cole will discuss Turkmenembroideries. In addition, he will explore a com-parative study of certain Baluch weavings, prima-rily balishts. Hands-on study will include unpub-lished, world-class examples of Turkmen, Baluch andnon-Turkmen Central Asian carpets. Participants areencouraged to bring pieces from their own collec-

tions for further examination and discussion withElena, Tom, and the other participants. ContactLesley Gamble at lgamble@ufl.edu for more infor-mation.

Exhibitions and Fairs:100 Weaves of India, a sale and exhibition of en-dangered textile arts, until November 16th at theBrookline Arts Center, 86 Monmouth Street,Brookline (call 617-566-5715 or visitwww.brooklineartscenter.com for information). Or-ganized by a team of Boston-area women with tiesto India, the exhibition showcases weavings, embroi-deries and printed fabrics from different regions ofIndia (see sample on page 10). The proceeds willhelp support FIRE: Funding Indian Rural Enterprise,an association for encouraging entrepreneurshipamong rural Indian communities and focusing onwomen’s education and sustainable employment.The Brookline Art Center also features photographsof India and Indian textiles in their native setting byDon Gurewitz. NERS members Christina Kasica andBasharat Sheikh are among the exhibition's organiz-ers.San Francisco Tribal and Textile Arts Show, 2/13-

15. For information visit www.caskeylees.com.

Tours:Kathy Green of the Toronto Rug Society is orga-nizing the following Asian tours that might be of in-terest to textile lovers. The destinations are:Central Asia, the Mysterious East: Kazakstan,Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, 4/25-5/17/04, led by Natalia Nekrassova, our November 2002meeting speakerIndia: Northern Highlights, Rajasthan & Gujarat,10/26-11/15/04.For details, call 905-471-7381 or email to102377.1463@compuserve.com.

Newsletter contributors and helpers: Yon Bard (editor), Jim Adelson, Dora Bard, Ed Berkhoff, MarkHopkins, Ronald and Selma Newburgh, Ann Nicholas, Rosalie and Mitch Rudnick, Janet SmithComments/contributions/for sale ads to: Yonathan Bard, doryon@rcn.com

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New England Rug SocietyPost Office Box 582, Lincoln, MA 01773

Blouse from the Rabari tribe, 100 Weaves of India (see page 9)

IN THIS ISSUE.....Next meeting 1September meeting review. 1ICOC reports 5Member mini-profiles 6J. Powell kilims in Istanbul 8NERS news 8Upcoming Events 9