Let's dig a bit about the story of west-african indigo, where our pieces come from.
Pays Dogon – Mali
Archaelogical evidence found at Bandiagara indicates that Dogon people have being using indigofera plant for dyeing cloth for at least a thousand years. Locally and organically grown, hand-harvested and dried in the sun, balls of crushed leaves are left to soaking, fermentation with traditional potassium, oxidation in a vat. following the dogon tradition, hand-woven stripes of organic cloth are stitched together and hand-knotted to create the pattern (resist dyeing process). To archieve the desire hue of blue, clothes are dipped repeateadly in the vat, exposed to the air then immersed again, in a process that take days or weeks. the process is then finished by removing the knots, washing and punding the fabric.
In Pays Dogon, indigo dyeing is an exclusive female affair performed by a few families only.
Revered for its beauty, indigo is associated with dignity, intuition, spirituality; specially worn in ceremonies and rituals.
Here a few pictures of indigo from west-africa and other parts of the world (1 - Paul Grootes, 2 and 3 - Pia Ulin, 4 and 5 - so sorry, can't find it. Please let me know if you know). How do you like it?
No comments:
Post a Comment