Art and Design Commons^™

#Existenceisresistance: Black Spartans Exhibition, Yeab Kebede

McNair Research Journal SJSU

This research paper explores the intersection of art and social justice, with a specific focus on the Black Spartans (1907-1948) Exhibit that showcased 19 Black students who attended San José State University from 1907 to 1948. The paper argues that art, in the form of visual representation, can serve as a powerful tool to address social injustices and provide a platform for underrepresented voices to be heard. By examining the Black Spartans exhibit, the paper highlights the significance of representation and how it can contribute to social justice movements. The paper also analyzes the impact of the exhibit on the …

A Photo Documentary: Exploring Queer Identities In Kwazulu-Natal, Nicholas Graves

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Media can be a powerful tool in examining the structures of power that both hinder and advance LGBTQIA+ representation and subsequently, lived experiences. Therefore, being able to understand the varying feelings that everyday South Africans feel towards queer people, will be measured through the media that people consume. For the vast majority of South Africans, this would look like movies, TV soap operas, and discussions that take place on the radio. Understanding the role media plays within the country is vital to understanding the overall progress that has been made.

The media’s ability to reflect lived experiences within gay and …

Pain & Glory, Wardah Sabrie

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Behind the glass, the work exists in many styles. Through all of them, Sabrie finds a release of her emotional extremes, leading her to a place of tranquility. In this print and installation collection, Sabrie intends to show her perspective on Somali culture as well as her emotional and mental health issues through delightful patterns and colors. She creates works about her relationships with the people that she cares so much about in her life. They are the leading muses for her ideas that then are compose into prints. In addition to that, her culture plays a huge role in …

The Hands That Weave Stories, Elanna Hawkins

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

There is a narrative encoded in carpets of Morocco, and I set out with the initial intention to learn how to “read” them—thinking that a Western sense of language is present from the symbols and patterns in the rug. As I progressed in my research and met the skilled women artisans, I realized that I needed to rethink how a story that doesn’t necessarily require a written format can be told to relate to these cultural totems of Morocco. Through in-person experience and online research, I discovered many designs and backgrounds unique to specific regions and areas. Rugs can tell …

Shifting Sands., Rachid Tagoulla

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Shifting Sands is a re-exploration of the presentation of North Africans in colonial postcards, an examination of identity, and a critique of the modern Western museum. Since the inception of photography, colonizers used this medium- especially in the form of postcards- to categorize and exoticize Eastern peoples in order to more easily subjugate them. Shifting Sands is a series of reconstructed colonial postcards which challenges colonial-era stereotypes of North African peoples. The colonial gaze, represented by the camera lens, is subverted through a lensless image-making process in which sand is used to remove the subject from the colonial gaze and …

Kofifi/Covfefe: How The Costumes Of "Sophiatown" Bring 1950s South Africa To Western Massachusetts In 2020, Emma Hollows

Masters Theses

This thesis paper reflects upon the costume design process taken by Emma Hollows to produce a realist production of the Junction Avenue Theatre Company’s musical Sophiatown at the Augusta Savage Gallery at the University of Massachusetts in May 2020. Sophiatown follows a household forcibly removed from their homes by the Native Resettlement Act of 1954 amid apartheid in South Africa. The paper discusses her attempts as a costume designer to strike a balance between replicating history and making artistic changes for theatre, while always striving to create believable characters.

Pleasure Is All Mine, Lola Ogbara

Graduate School of Art Theses

One’s identity is shaped by many factors such as race, culture, physical appearance, nationality, and religion—amongst many more. As an artist, the subjugation of identity in the context of race, gender, and sexuality is a world I examine closely. Subverting myths of sexual deviancy and racial inferiority that perpetually pathologizes Black feminine sexuality, I often use and reference my own body to create avenues of power through physical and intellectual pleasure. Through material use of clay, metal, photography, and installation, I emphasize on how contemporary Black social cultures are able to write their own narratives in order to further progressions …

Frontmatter For Egyptian Textiles And Their Production: ‘Word’ And ‘Object’. (Hellenistic, Roman And Byzantine Periods), Maria Mossakowska-Gaubert

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

Covers

Dedication

Contents

Introduction by Maria Mossakowska-Gaubert

Contributors

A New Kind Of Loom In Early Roman Egypt? How Iconography Could Explain (Or Not) Papyrological Evidence, Maria Mossakowska-Gaubert

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

The question of the different kinds of loom used in ancient Egypt is one of the most crucial issues to understanding the evolution of textile production and its technological development in the Nile Valley. However, sources concerning looms (archaeological, iconographic and written) from the Pharaonic era until the Arab medieval period are meagre, and many research questions remain open. This article is an attempt at a new interpretation of some evidence, particularly iconographic and papyrological, which could add new data to the study of weaving looms used in Egypt of the early Roman period (1st–2nd century AD).

Tackling The Technical History Of The Textiles Of El-Deir, Kharga Oasis, The Western Desert Of Egypt, Fleur Letellier-Willemin

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

The site of El-Deir is situated north of Kharga in the “Great Oasis” of the Egyptian Western Desert (fig. 1). The site was occupied between the 6th century BC and the 6th century AD. A complex history emerged with the influence of many cultures: Persian, Greek, Roman and early Christian. Archaeological finds in both El-Deir and the oasis itself (the site of Dush and the temple of Darius in Hibis, a city north of Kharga) confirm that the Great Oasis was a wealthy region. This is also substantiated by texts from Ain Manawir and Dakhleh. The presence of an artesian …

Reconstruction Of A Deconstructed Tunic, Anne Kwaspen

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

Tunics of the 1st millennium AD can be classified into two main groups according to the direction of the warp in the finished tunic. The first group of tunics has horizontal warp threads in the finished tunic. This means that the cloth as it is worn is rotated 90° from the weave direction on the loom. In the second group of tunics the warp runs vertically in the finished tunic. Each group of tunics has their typical technological features and finishing methods, with additional distinctions between wool and linen tunics. This article focuses on the study of a tunic belonging …

What Flaws Can Tell: A Case Study On Weaving Faults In Late Roman And Early Medieval Weft-Faced Compound Fabrics From Egypt, Barbara Köstner

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

Silk samites from Late Roman and Early Medieval Egypt are well-known objects in museum collections all over the world. One group of fragments, the so-called Akhmim silks, show a mechanically repeated floral pattern. More than 100 examples with this design are known; the fragments bear striking similarities in design and technique. Were they woven in the same workshop? If all or at least a large number of pieces could be traced back to several batches of production, this would lead to further insights concerning the economics of early silk weaving. A detailed analysis of two exemplary pieces reveals features that …

Ancient Greek Dyeing: A Terminological Approach, Peder Flemestad

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

The Oxford English Dictionary defines dyeing as: “to impregnate (any tissue or the like) with a colour, to fix a colour in the substance of, or to change the hue of by a colouring matter”. In ancient Greek this operation is in general expressed by the verb βάπτειν, but the process of dyeing could be designated by a multitude of other terms. The following contribution provides an overview of the extensive ancient Greek terminology for the action of dyeing. The focus therefore lies primarily on the verbs designating the dyeing process itself, while wider dye terminology is only occasionally touched …

Dyeing In Texts And Textiles: Words Expressing Ancient Technology, Ines Bogensperger, Helgo Rösel-Mautendorfer

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

The complex chaîne opératoire of ancient textile production in various stages has been frequently discussed by textile scholars. According to documentary papyri, textile manufacturing represented the highest taxed industry after agriculture. This emphasises its importance as a significant sector in the ancient economy. A highly specialised branch within the chaîne opératoire is the dyeing industry. Ancient dyers used natural and animal dyestuffs, as well as different dyeing techniques to achieve their colourful results. They were also aware of the specific properties of the different textile fibres. In ancient times, wool and linen were the characteristic materials for manufacturing textiles, but …

Textile Production In The Papyri: The Case Of Private Request Letters, Aikaterini Koroli

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

Throughout the “papyrological millennium”, that is from the 3rd century BC to the 8th century AD, both administrative and private life in Egypt were largely based on letters. Apart from oral communication, letter writing, mostly on papyri and ostraca, was the only available form of communication for the inhabitants of the land of Nile when they needed to get in touch and exchange information with people who did not live in their immediate surroundings. Papyrus letters, written by and sent to private, ordinary people and not to the authorities, composed in the Greek vernacular and intended to fulfill a wide …

How (Not) To Organise Roman Textile Production. Some Considerations On Merchant-Entrepreneurs In Roman Egypt And The Ἱστωνάρχης, Kerstin Droß-Krüpe

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

For almost the last 100 years, various ancient historians have suggested that organisations comparable to the “putting- out” system existed in the Roman Imperial period. They are most commonly believed to have occurred in textile production. As early as 1913, Theodor Reil assumed that the production of textiles in Roman Egypt was organised through the putting-out system. This idea can subsequently be traced through more than a century to recent publications. However, as this assumption is rarely based on genuine source material, it seems appropriate to get to the bottom of this hypothesis. In this context, special attention will also …

Domestic Textile Production In Dakhleh Oasis In The Fourth Century Ad, Jennifer Cromwell

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

Ancient Kellis, modern Ismant el-Kharab is located in Dakhleh Oasis in Egypt’s Western Desert. The main occupation of the village was from the early to late Roman period (late 1st century to the beginning of the 5th century AD). Excavated as part of the Dakhleh Oasis Project, the site has revealed textual and archaeological evidence from which a detailed picture of life can be painted. To date, the main publications of the village’s finds have focussed on the textual remains, of literary and documentary texts in Coptic, Greek, and Syriac.1 A comparable publication of the archaeological evidence from the site …

Conclusion: Egyptian Textiles And Their Production, Dominique Cardon

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

This book, “Egyptian textiles and their production: ‘word’ and ‘object’ (Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine periods)” is both very useful and… frustrating. Indeed, all volumes of transactions of a scientific symposium are bound to be so, since research is a never-ending story. However, this is particularly true of textile research, which involves so many different approaches. Most of the relevant scientific domains are represented in this volume. There is a good combination of several reports on new research – recently studied archaeological textiles and iconographic documents on weaving – with attempts at syntheses of available evidence, both archaeological and textual, alongside …

Egyptian Pit-Looms From The Late First Millennium Ad — Attempts In Reconstruction From The Archaeological Evidence, Johanna Sigl

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

In discussions on the development of weaving technology, specifically treadle looms in the Mediterranean area, Egypt is often referred to as one of the earliest countries in which people used foot-powered looms for producing cloth. It is thought to have been in regular use in the production of cloth as early as the second half of the 1st millennium AD. This belief is built on results from excavations undertaken during the early 20th century by the Egypt Exploration Fund at the hill of Sheikh Abd el-Qurna in Luxor, as well as on textile studies. Unfortunately, none of the postulated looms …

Flax Growing In Late Antique Egypt: Evidence From The Aphrodito Papyri, Isabelle Marthot-Santaniello

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

While flax culture was a major economic sector in Egypt throughout antiquity and the medieval period, one can only agree with John R. Rea, the editor of P. Coll.Youtie II 68, when he says: “it has not escaped notice that surprisingly little information about [flax and linen] has been recovered from the Greek papyri”. By way of example, the specific word for the flax plant, linokalamē, appears in Greek papyri only in around 60 of more than 60,000 published texts. More specifically, the agricultural conditions set to produce flax are seldom visible in the texts: little more than twenty documents …

Textiles From A Late Roman/Byzantine Ecclesiastical Centre At Abu Sha’Ar, Egypt, Lise Bender Jørgensen

Egyptian Textiles and Their Production: ‘Word’ and ‘Object’

Around AD 400 a group of Christians were looking for a new home. An abandoned Roman military fort at what is now called Abu Sha’ar, c. 20 km north of Hurghada on the Egyptian Red Sea coast, became the answer to their prayers. Steven Sidebotham of the University of Delaware excavated the site in 1987-1993. The fort had been established in AD 309-311 to house a mounted unit, the Ala Nova Maximiana, guarding the Via Nova Hadriana. The military phase was however short-lived: the soldiers abandoned the fort before AD 400. The new settlers turned the former military headquarters into …

Resilience, Resistance And Revival In 20th-Century Yoruba Art, Charles Mason, Andie Near

Kruizenga Art Museum Exhibition Catalogs

Kruizenga Art Museum, Hope College Catalog for exhibition: “Resilience, Resistance and Revival in 20th-Century Yoruba Art”. Exhibition dates: January 17—May 16, 2020. Charles Mason, author; Andie Near, photographer, designer; Lisa Barney, editor; Cecilia O’Brien ‘21, typographer.

Z4, A Slow Puncture: An Autoethnographic Exploration Of Language, Embodiment, And Meaning-Making, Charlotte Rose Samuels

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

In my ISP, I explored language as it relates to the ways in which people living in Cato Manor make sense of HIV/AIDS in their community. With 7.1-7.2 million people living with HIV (PLWHIV) in South Africa, individuals across the country are either infected or affected by illness. KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), the province with the highest rate of HIV, is also the province that was surveyed with the disproportionately highest internal stigma rates for PLWHIV. High prevalence of HIV, particularly in KZN, calls for a constant contextualization of life in the presence of illness.

Throughout the world, metaphor and symbolism is …

African Affinity Mask, Giselle M. Strauss

Toyon: Multilingual Literary Magazine

N/A

Masks: A New Face For The Theatre, Alexi Michael Siegel

James Madison Undergraduate Research Journal (JMURJ)

This study seeks to reimagine and reinvigorate modern theatre’s relationship with mask work through text-based historical research and practice-based artistic research. It focuses on three ancient mask traditions: pre- and early Hellenistic Greek theatre, Japanese Noh theatre, and Nigerian Egungun masquerades. Research on these mask traditions and recent masked productions informed the development and staging of a masked performance of Charles Mee’s Life is a Dream. The production featured sections for each of the ancient masking styles and a final section that explored masks in a contemporary theatrical style. As a whole, this creative project pulls masks out of …

Livelihoods Of The People Of Mazumbai: A Collection Of Stories And Portraits, Tanga Region, Tanzania, Joseph Baldus

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Despite rapid urbanization in Tanzania, agriculture remains central to the nation, the economy, and the livelihoods of a large portion of the population. Smallholder farmers account for the vast majority of agricultural production, yet are an extremely vulnerable population due to poverty, single-sourced income, and climate-dependency for both subsistence and cash-crop agriculture (Rapsomanikis, 2015). This report explores these dynamic rural livelihoods through interviews and portrait photographs in a case study on Mazumbai, Tanga region, Tanzania. Semi-structured interviews explore the people’s modes of economic subsistence, domestic lives, education, challenges, and life stories. Excerpts from these interviews combined with portrait photographs create …

Think Outside: Exploring The Influence Of Nature On The Individual And Of The Individual On Society, Brielle Wells

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This video project has an overarching goal to question the influence the natural environment has on the development of individual people and society as a whole. It begins by looking into the important role played by creativity in societal and economic development. From here a brief background is given on the requirements of maintaining and producing a creative environment. The piece alludes to the possibility that a relationship with nature has a deeper meaning than just being conducive to creativity. It also shows the effects pollution has had on the work of local artists and briefly the challenges faced by …

Living Tradition: Contemporary Ethiopian Christian Art From The Sobania Collection, Neal Sobania, Charles Mason, Nina Kay, Andie Near, Raymond Silverman, Tom Wagner

Kruizenga Art Museum Exhibition Catalogs

Produced by Storming the Castle Pictures for the Kruizenga Art Museum as a catalog for the exhibition “Living Tradition: Contemporary Ethiopian Contemporary Art from the Sobania Collection,” September 21 – December 15, 2018. Photography by the Kruizenga Art Museum, Neal Sobania, Raymond Silverman and Tom Wagner. Design by Tom Wagner.

Weaving Identity: Stories And Manifestations Of Amazigh Carpet Weavers In The Moroccan Village Of Tarmilat, Alessandra Roggero

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

It is in the small villages of Morocco, scattered across the North in the Rif, to the South in the Anti-Atlas Mountains, and in between, where the majority of Morocco’s celebrated and beloved Amazigh carpets are made. Their power and popularity can be attributed to the indigenous female artists who have been crafting these physical tokens of memory, protection, and Amazigh identity, for millenniums. In an attempt to connect the trade of carpet weaving in Morocco back to these women and their families, this research project will explore their narratives, and the social and spatial implications of their craft, a …

Conservation Workshops In Djenné, Mali, 2015 And 2017, Michaelle L. Biddle

Michaelle Biddle