Woman’s Ceremonial Skirt
CultureKuba peoples, Bushoong subgroup
Dateearly 1900s
MediumBarkcloth (ficus) and pigment
DimensionsOverall: 14 5/8 × 80 1/2 × 3/4 inches (37.15 × 204.47 × 1.91 cm)
Credit LinePurchase: the Shirley and Barnett Helzberg Fund in support of the African Art department
Object number2018.59.1
On View
Not on viewCollections
DescriptionThis object is a pounded, dyed, and pieced barkcloth skirt. The ceremonial skirt features four distinct sections of abstract geometric pattern that have been stitched together with raffia threads. Each of the four panels is a different quilted design, utilizing diamonds, squares, chevrons, lines and triangles in the patterns. The individual pieces within each pattern are dyed dark brown/gray, red or tan. This section of the skirt is only bordered on three of the four sides, indicating that the skirt may have extended further at one point.Exhibition HistoryWeaving Abstraction: Kuba Textiles and the Woven Art of Central Africa, The Textile Museum, Washington, DC, October 15, 2011-February 12, 2012, no. 67.
With Pierre Loos, Brussels, Belgium, by 1990 [1];
Purchased from Loos by the dealer Andres Moraga, Berkeley, CA, 1990-2018;
Purchased from Andres Moraga by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 2018.
NOTES:
[1] According to Andres Moraga, in email correspondence with Rachel Kabukala, Curatorial Assistant, June 28, 2018, NAMA curatorial files, this textile “…came from a well-known Belgian dealer, Mr. Pierre Loos, with whom I worked closely on developing the market for Kuba textiles starting in 1982. The active period was between 1982 and 1990.”
Vanessa Drake Moraga, Weaving Abstraction: Kuba Textiles and the Woven Art of Central Africa, exh. cat. (Washington, DC: The Textile Museum, 2011), 138-139, (repro.).
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F91-77/12
