After reading the little book “Cut My Cote” by Dorothy K. Burnham (of the Textile Department in the Royal Ontario Museum) one word comes to mind:
Provenance.
In particular, the provenance of our woven cloth.
On "Cut My Cloth's" cover you see a simple illustration: one large white coat embroidered with black vegetation patterns. The patterns look likes leaves. They also remind me of the awesome designs I've seen inside of Muslim mosques around the world. (Well, technically what I've seen through pictures of mosques around the world. hahaha)
Today, in Sacramento, California---- we see these same shapes printed onto long flowy summer dresses at Buffalo Exchange, on tote bags carried by women and men who work at Multi-Cultural Centers, on shirts worn by homeless humans sitting on concrete benches outside local libraries.
Ancient patterns are invoked on the modern material objects we use throughout our day-to-day existences.
Is this material symbolism a reversion back to nature? A reversion back to our origins? the soil----the land-----the flowers-----the nostalgic trees of our childhood?
Do beginnings have no end and ends have no beginnings?
Yet there is another, more far-reaching meaning. The simple traditional garments of many cultures, changing infinitely slowly over long periods of time, have both consistency and incredible variety. What are the influences that govern their shapes and forms? …the material from which a garment is made is the factor that has most influence on the particular shaping of it…
------a passage from pg 2 of "Cut My Cloth"
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