Textiles of Timor, Island in the Woven Sea

Conflict in Timor from 1975–99 prevented access by researchers. As a result, the island’s remarkable textile traditions have never before been fully explored in an exhibition. Curator Roy Hamilton describes the efforts that have unfolded over the past ten years to understand better how and why such radically different styles of cloth came to be dispersed across this intriguing island. Next curator Joanna Barkman compares past and present textile production practices of the Makasae peoples of Baguia village, located in the 21st century’s first independent nation—Timor-Leste. She will describe the return to the community of photographic images taken in 1935 by an expedition from the Museum der Kulturen in Basel, Switzerland. Based on responses from weavers to these images and the cloths collected eighty years ago, the presentation will consider the changes as well as continuities experienced by the people of Baguia.