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SAM'S collection

Cloth with Proverbial Text

Date20th century
Label TextIndigo is a natural dye that sometimes suggests the hues of a midnight sky, shadows of dusk and dawn, as well as a melancholy mood. In Nigeria, plain cotton shirting began arriving from England in the early 20th century. It was disregarded until indigo dyers began making the cotton into canvases by using feathers or stencils with cassava paste. In order to achieve the deepest blue-black, the cloth would be dipped repeatedly in a dye vat. One cloth quotes from the proverb, Atari Ajanaku Kinse Eru Omode:"The head of an elephant is no load for a child."
Object number2001.981
Exhibition HistorySeattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Indigo, May 9 - Oct. 19, 2003. Seattle, Washington, Seattle Asian Art Museum, Mood Indigo: Textiles from Around the World, Apr. 9 - Oct. 9, 2016.
Credit LineGift of the Christensen Fund
Dimensions83 11/16 x 72 5/8 in. (212.5 x 184.5 cm)
MediumCotton cloth, factory woven plain weave, paste resist (adire eleko) with indigo dye
20th century
Object number: 2001.979
early 20th century
Object number: 2001.976
Object number: 2001.977
20th century
Object number: 2001.989
Cloth (Adire Alabere)
early 20th century
Object number: 81.17.657
Object number: 2001.982
Photo: Paul Macapia
Japanese
ca. 1900
Object number: 89.147
Cloth
20th century
Object number: 81.17.654
Photo: Elizabeth Mann
19th century
Object number: 40.24
Photo: Elizabeth Mann
19th century
Object number: 37.35
Farmer's coat
Japanese
19th century
Object number: 89.146
Fireman's coat
Japanese
first half 19th century
Object number: 82.129