The Handbook of Textile Culture

Description

In recent years, the study of textiles and culture has become a dynamic field of scholarship, reflecting new global, material and technological possibilities. This is the first handbook of specially commissioned essays to provide a guide to the major strands of critical work around textiles past and present and to draw upon the work of artists and designers as well as researchers in textiles studies. The handbook offers an authoritative and wide-ranging guide to the topics, issues, and questions that are central to the study of textiles today: it examines how material practices reflect cross-cultural influences; it explores textiles' relationships to history, memory, place, and social and technological change; and considers their influence on fashion and design, sustainable production, craft, architecture, curation and contemporary textile art practice. This illustrated volume will be essential reading for students and scholars involved in research on textiles and related subjects such as dress, costume and fashion, feminism and gender, art and design, and cultural history. Cover image: Anne Wilson, To Cross (Walking New York), 2014. Site-specific performance and sculpture at The Drawing Center, NYC. Thread cross research. Photo: Christie Carlson/Anne Wilson Studio.

Janis Jefferies is Professor of Visual Arts, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK Diana Wood Conroy is Emeritus Professor of Visual Arts, University of Wollongong, Australia Hazel Clark is Professor of Design Studies and Fashion Studies, and Research Chair of Fashion, Parsons School of Design, The New School, New York, USA

The Handbook of Textile Culture is a ground-breaking book, and essential reading for all who seek insights into the recent past, present and future of textiles. * TEXT * This book fascinates and, with such engaging and diverse content, it will attract and inform many readers ... I suspect its full significance in the expanding fields of textile practices, textile studies and textile histories will only become evident in a decade or so, when its scope and impact can be better understood. * Textile History * Finally, a textile compendium! Dense, graphic and packed with useful footnotes, The Handbook of Textile Cultureis a thematic overview covering the paradigm shift of textiles and its contributions to practice, academia, and museology. * Textile Society of America * By compiling contributions from twenty-eight scholars, curators, designers, and others, the organizers of The Handbook of Textile Culture set out to bring cultural understanding of textile making to the fore. This is an ambitious undertaking given the sprawling character of textile art, but the editors are among the contemporary textile world's most respected thinkers... This substantial volume is an important contribution to contemporary art history studies, and will be a valued resource for students and scholars at the graduate level and beyond. -- Lynora Williams * Art Libraries Society of North America Reviews * Textile-based practices are currently on the cutting edge of aesthetic practice and critical inquiry. This constellation of textile thinking and making is excellently captured in The Handbook of Textile Culture. Edited and written by leading theorists, historians, and practitioners in the field, this far-ranging and deep-reaching anthology covers the intersections between and across feminisms, queer and trans theories, and post-colonial discourses. Offering a remarkably diverse collection of global perspectives, this volume will surely be a leading resource for students, scholars, and professionals for years to come. -- Deborah Valoma, California College of the Arts, USA This state-of-the-art handbook on the field of textile studies is an excellent reference work for any higher education arts program. * American Reference Books Annual * [Huge] in scope and status ... [For] anyone interested in subjects that range from cultural history to costume and fashion, from gender and feminist issues ... through to the world of art, design craft, this is a book that raises issues, concepts, ideas and differences. * The Textile Blog * An outstanding collection ... I am very drawn to The Handbook of Textile Culture and glad to have it in my possession. Each essay that I investigate is fascinating and there's no reason not to take my time with it, to savour and digest. * Fibre Forum e-bulletin (created on behalf of TAFTA) * What a colossal achievement. This is not just the most comprehensive survey of the global production of textiles, and the widest conceptual reframing of the role of textiles in contemporary art and design, it is also a mosaic of sparkling intelligence. This handbook will serve as an essential guide and remain as a vital resource for many years to come. It will be the new encyclopedia textilica! -- Nikos Papastergiadis, University of Melbourne, Australia With a myriad of approaches, theories and stories, this exquisitely curated treasure-trove of essays, articles and interviews is the definitive resource for scholars and creative researchers. This anthology is a goldmine for postdocs, and university researchers at all levels. Affirming the cultural value of textiles, the collection offers a unique journey into the hearts and minds of those who make, study, and engage in the complexity and beauty of textile experience. -- Barbara Layne, Studio subTela and Concordia University, Montreal, Canada