Egypt and Japan interlace in Australia

Weaving underway with the narrow warp I decided to use tapestry techniques to emulate the rounded shapes of the potatoes. I’m weaving lozenge shapes to get the feeling and using a little more of the contrasting orange that the imagery suggests so I can get a stronger effect. Historically this type of weave was explored best by the Egyptian Copts. Here is an example. Instead of weaving to a straight fell, the weave is built up to express the required shapes ignoring the inclination to have all rows even and ordered for either aesthetics or tension. The result is a weave that goes with the design rather than flattening it, especially curved and lozenge shapes. The skill of the weaver lies in balancing  the beat of each individual weft to allay tension issues which could impact on the completed cloth. 

I’m trying not to beat heavily overall but allowing some denseness for the lozenge wefts. I think this technique is really suited to the Saori technique.  What am I making? Skinny scarf mark one.  More next week.


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3 responses to “Egypt and Japan interlace in Australia”

  1. Terri Avatar

    That is looking very interesting. I’m surprised to see the orange -makes me think of sweet potatoes (kumara). I like the shapes that you are creating and they give me ideas for my apples photo…

    Happy Weaving,
    Terri

  2. Meg in Nelson Avatar

    I’m often surprised that over years (centuries?) that kind of build up ends up being smoothed down and flattened to “match” the surrounds, if that’s what we want, which is often what I like.

  3. Meg in Nelson Avatar

    It’d be very interesting to see how it washes/fulls.

    Kaz, I can’t tell you enough times how much I love the colors in the photo below your “Why Weave” section.

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