Logo

Textiles: Binding Threads between Cultures from National Museum Collection is significant publication in many ways. Although the museum does not have a dedicated textile department, there are seven departments, out of ten, who possess the textile collection. These departments have textiles collections of India mainly from North, East, South, West and North East preserved in Decorative Arts, Anthropology, Paintings, Manuscripts, Arms and Armour departments. Fairly representative artefacts are from the non-Indian collection, which belongs to Pre-Columbian and Western Arts and Central Asian Antiquities. Time to time different departments had organized the textile exhibition and also come up with the small publication of individual department. For the first time, a collaborative effort was taken and all department have come together for this special publication dedicated on textiles. For the first-time two-day symposium on "The Art of South Indian Embroidery and Preventive care of textiles" was organized in 2015. The focus of this symposium was the highlight the embroidery tradition of South India, which got less attention in comparison to other textile traditions of the Southern region. First five articles are from scholars, who had presented their research in the symposium. Dr Choodamani Nadagopal was the key speaker, who brought the various traditions of embroideries in the religious setting of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh. Professor Dr Vandana Bhandari had looked the overall variations including the tribal, ethnic, rural and urban. One of the masterpieces of decorative arts department of the National Museum is the hand embroidered ten feet long temple hanging, which has been studied by the Dr Anamika Pathak. The stitches of this hanging have been studied at the micro level by Dr Simmi Bhagat and Dr Rohini Arora. Ms. Smita Singh has studied the use of beetle wings in the South Indian embroideries. Rest of the papers are the encouraging efforts of the young curatorial staff of the National Museum from different departments, who have summaries their collection.The painting on cloth is one of the old traditions of India and still being practiced, which has been looked upon by the Dr Kanak Lata Singh. The manuscript department has an important the Holy Quran written jacket, which has been studied in detail by Mr. Khatibur Rahman. The overview of the textile collection of Decorative arts has been discussed by Mr. Zahid Ali Ansari. Similarly, the overview of the textile collection of Anthropology has been discussed by the Ms, Anju Sachdeva, and Mr. Sushmit Sharma. National Museum has the pride possession of two very important collections 'Pre-Columbian and Western Art' and 'Central Asian Antiquities', and both have a good representative textile collection. Brief about the textile collections have written by Dr Binoy Kumar Sahay for Central Asian Antiquities. And about the Pre-Columbian textiles have been discussed by Dr Mohan Pratap and Ms Shubha Banerjee. Influence of Kushana costumes was studied on coins is an interesting and important aspect to look upon the material culture, have been studied in detail by Ms. Komal Pande.