Friday, October 14
The Textile Museum
2320 S Street, NW

Opening Reception and Gallery Viewing • 7:15 – 9:00 PM
Be one of the first to view the exhibition Weaving Abstraction: Kuba Textiles and the Woven Art of Central Africa.

Saturday, October 15
The Jack Morton Auditorium, Media and Public Affairs Building,
The George Washington University. 805 21st St, NW.

Panel Discussions • 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM
See below for full description and presenter biographies.

Wine and Cheese Reception • 5:00 – 6:00 PM

Sunday, October 16
The Textile Museum
2320 S Street, NW

Continental Breakfast • 8:30 AM

Curator's tour of Weaving Abstraction • 9:15 – 10:00 AM
Led by guest curator Vanessa Drake Moraga

Show-and-Tell • 10:00 – 11:45 AM
Share and discuss your own African textile treasures with the experts

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SATURDAY MORNING SESSION

Moderator, Vanessa Drake Moraga
Guest Curator for Weaving Abstraction: Kuba Textiles and the Woven Art of Central Africa
The Textile Museum
Washington, DC

(Click on a presenter's name to read their biography)

Patricia Darish
Independent Scholar
Chevy Chase, MD
This Is Our Wealth: The Context of Kuba Textiles
Darish will establish the background of Kuba raffia textile production in Central Africa while exploring gender roles, lineage requirements, apprenticeships and textile production within the context of daily life. Her lecture will also examine individual creativity and aesthetics from the perspectives of Kuba textile artists.

Ramona Austin
Curator, Baron and Ellin Gordon Art Galleries, Old Dominion University
Norfolk, VA
William Henry Sheppard: Collecting Kuba Cloth, the Regalia of Authority and Memory of the Clan
William Henry Sheppard was an African-American Presbyterian missionary who, in the last decade of the 19th century, was the first westerner to enter the Kuba Kingdom. His intelligence, imposing physicality, intrepidness and language skills allowed him to make close contact with the Kuba and to amass the oldest collection of Kuba material. Among these materials, now owned by Hampton University in Virginia, are very fine and old examples of Kuba cut-pile and embroidered textiles. Sheppard’s collecting is important not only for understanding the Kuba, but also for understanding Central African traditions of leadership and clan relationships in which textiles play a such crucial role.

Wendy Grossman
Curatorial Associate, The Phillips Collection
Washington, DC
Interventions in Modernist Narratives: African Textiles and 20th-Century Western Artistic Practices
While the influence of African masks and sculpture on early twentieth-century artistic practices in Europe and the United States is well established, the parallel role of African textiles has received far less scholarly attention. Indeed, the notion that “African art” equals “African sculpture” still prevails in the Western imagination and in modernist narratives. Grossman will challenge that perception through an examination of African textiles, and Kuba textiles in particular, in the development of a Western modernist aesthetic. Featuring work by Sonia Delauney, artists of the Harlem Renaissance, Paul Klee, Henri Matisse, and Man Ray, new insights will be provided into the profound influence African textiles had on avant-garde art, fashion, and notions of modernity in the first decades of the 20th century.

SATURDAY AFTERNOON SESSION

Moderator, Lee Talbot
Curator, Eastern Hemisphere Collections
The Textile Museum
Washington, DC

Elisabeth Cameron
Patricia & Rowland Rebele Chair in the History of Art and Visual Culture
University of California, Santa Cruz
The Two Lives of Kuba Textiles: Exploring the Kuba Textile Collection at the Fowler Museum at UCLA
Kuba textiles are understood and used very differently among the Kuba and in Western collections and museums. On closer examination, however, there are surprising similarities in ritual and display. Cameron will compare and contrast the reception of Central African textiles in Western collections and museums through an examination of the display of Kuba textiles at the Fowler Museum at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Enid Schildkrout
Independent Curator
New York, NY
Congo Connections: African-American Baskets as Containers of Memory
The most enduring African-American art form today is the coiled basket. Once a utilitarian object produced in abundance by enslaved people on southern rice plantations, the coiled basket has evolved and become an art form and symbol of African-American identity. While basketry is found all over the world, these African American baskets, often called “Gullah baskets,” have clear African connections, both to the rice growing areas of coastal West Africa and also to the Congo. Schildkrout will trace the West and Central African origins of African-American basketry and discuss the different ways the baskets are said to contain memories of their maker’s African roots.

Niangi Batulukisi
Independent Curator and Author
Aurora, CO
The Global Impact of Collecting Central African Textiles in the 21st Century
Batulukisi’s lecture will focus on the challenges faced by both collectors of African textiles and the artists that create them for the market. Batulukisi will begin by highlighting the story of Kuba textiles and the role played by collectors in the survival and revitalization of this ethnographic art form. In recent years, the development of new motifs and designs which pleased local users—as well as international collectors, designers, and museums—are factors that have fostered this ongoing interest.

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The Normandy hotel is conveniently located within walking distance of The Textile Museum. Please see below for details about discounted room rates. Please note that rates are subject to change based on availability, so guests should plan to reserve space as early as possible.

Normandy Hotel
2118 Wyoming Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20008
Please ask for The Textile Museum preffered rate: $199, excluding room tax of 14.5% per room, per night. There is an additional $20 per day for triple/quad occupancy. For reservations, call 1-800-423-6953 by Wednesday, September 22.

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STUDENT SCHOLARSHIPS
The Textile Museum is pleased to offer 10 scholarships for this year’s annual Fall Symposium, October 14-16, 2011.

The Textile Museum believes that this scholarship opportunity at its annual symposium is a tangible way to express The Museum’s commitment to academic leadership in textile research and will ensure that the next generation of textile experts receives the unique and in-depth knowledge that can only come at a conference such as this.

Undergraduate or graduate students in African studies or a textile-related course of study are invited to apply. The scholarship will cover the cost of the registration and is not a cash award. Following the symposium, the recipients will be asked to write a brief report on the symposium’s highlights. This report may appear in a Textile Museum publication or online.

To apply, please submit:

1. Completed application form
2. A paragraph (maximum 250 words) outlining how participating in The Textile Museum’s Annual Fall Symposium would relate to and benefit your education, chosen career path, and professional goals
3. Resume (2 pages maximum)
4. Two letters of recommendation (send under separate cover)

Scholarship submissions will be reviewed by The Textile Museum Symposium Awards Committee.

Deadline: September 15, 2011

To be considered for a scholarship, all completed applications, resumes (2 pages maximum), and the recommendations must be received by COB, September 15, 2011.

Applications and recommendations can be emailed to info@textilemuseum.org with “Symposium Scholarship” in the subject line, faxed to (202) 483-0994 or mailed to The Textile Museum, Attn: Tom Goehner, 2320 S St. NW, Washington, DC 20008.

In any event, please take advantage of additional symposium savings through the special student and early bird discount rates.

SCHOLARSHIPS FOR DCPS EDUCATORS

The Textile Museum is pleased to offer five individual scholarships to DC Public School and Public Charter School Educators, which will cover the Annual Symposium Registration Fee, admittance to the Weaving Abstraction: Kuba Textiles and the Woven Art of Central Africa opening reception October 14, 2011 and all lectures and events of the Symposium.  The annual Textile Museum Fall Symposium is designed to bring together individuals interested in learning more about textiles, to promote scholarship, camaraderie and the informal exchange of ideas. 

The Textile Museum Scholarship for DCPS Educators is open to all teachers employed at any DC Public or Public Charter School for the 2011-2012 academic school year.
Applicants must submit the following information electronically:
1.  Online application [PDF]
2.  A 250 word bio that will be used in Symposium literature at The Museum’s discretion.

Complete applications must be received by COB Monday, September 19, 2011.  All entries will be reviewed by a panel of Textile Museum scholars and curators.  Recipients of The Textile Museum Scholarship for DCPS Educators will be notified by email no later than September 30, 2011

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REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Fees:

Regular Registration (After September 1, 2011)
$270 TM Member
$315 Non-Member (includes a one-year membership to The Textile Museum)
$180 Student/Faculty (includes a one-year membership to The Textile Museum)

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REGISTER ONLINE NOW

Online registration is available through The Textile Museum Shop.

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DOWNLOAD REGISTRATION FORM

2011 Symposium Registration Form [PDF]

The registration form can be submitted via mail or fax:

The Textile Museum
2320 S Street, NW
Washington, DC 20008-4008

Fax: (202) 483-0994

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