Social histories woven into Indonesian textiles at LACMA

When I saw this picture, I thought that it was so detailed. I'm really into tribal prints and such so this was something that I was intrigued in. It's very nice right? Well I found an article on LAtimes.com: With more than 17,000 islands and about 300 ethnic groups, Indonesia is among the most culturally diverse countries in the world. So the exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art featuring 90-plus textile works from the collection of Mary Hunt Kahlenberg -- a onetime LACMA curator and co-owner of TAI Gallery/Textile Arts in Santa Fe, N.M. -- is appropriately eclectic. It extends over five centuries (from the 15th to the 20th) and includes ceremonial cloths and traditional clothing evincing a host of outside influences.

To the layperson, however, the 19th and 20th century works are perhaps the most compelling. Not only are they easier to decipher pictorially, but they also clearly reflect an intermingling of international cultures.

Take a woman's wrap skirt, or kain panjang, circa 1905. Decorated in red and black batik, a dyeing technique native to Indonesia, it features a sinuous pattern of cranes and lotuses that could easily pass for Chinese or, as the wall text suggests, for European Art Nouveau (which was in turn influenced by Japanese aesthetics). The caption also speculates that the cloth was made in a Dutch-owned Javanese workshop, reminding us that Indonesia was a colony of the Netherlands for 3 1/2 centuries before World War II.

Original Article