The Textile Museum

Here is a place to visit in Washington, off the normal tourist trail. Located in the Kalorama neighborhood, in an elegant house, it features special textile exhibits, has an extensive library, and offers classes of various sorts. It is free, and parking is easy. There is a gift shop. The museum appears to be very well maintained.

There are two exhibits now.

The first, Rozome Masters of Japan, closes on February 12. It has a number of largely contemporary art works on fabric, created using an old hot wax technique, where the wax is applied with brushes. Most of the pieces are screens, mainly flat mounted on the wall, but there is also several kimonos and other items.

I cannot understand the technique, which is apparently about 1500 years old, but which had gone out of fashion and has only been recently revived. The designs went from realistic nature designs (birds and flowers, mainly), to social settings of various sorts, to abstract designs, some soft and some harsh.

My favorite is called Upheaval Seashore by Chie Otani, a four part screen of a bright and highly textured bring orange-red-brown shore, with protruding rocks, which look almost like helmets left from a recent battle. Some I did not like at all, particularly those that were the most abstract.

The second exhibit, which runs until February 26, is called "Silk and Leather: Splendid Attire of Nineteenth Century Central Asia", and that is what it is. Adult and children's clothing, men's and women's, cloaks, boots, hats, belts and more.

The colors tend to be very bright. The embroidery techniques are quite old. According to the material available at the exhibit, the 19th century in what is now Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan was apparently properous enough to engender a revised interest in highly decorative apparel, and this exhibit shows a variety of what was produced.

Worth seeing. For a preview, go to www.textilemuseum.org.