English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

archetypal symbols are nearly always present. They concentrate magical powers and are known throughout all the different regions of North Africa as signs of protection (the “hand” with its symbolic meaning of “khamsa/five,” “star,” “eye/amulet”). The loss of meaning of certain signs and patterns is compensated for by local experiences of life and the environment. Thus, new symbols come into being, such as a coloured embroidered motif on the south Tunisian melhafa (a wrap-around robe worn by women) that can be identified as representing the footprints of desert animals in Sahara sand, or the Solomon’s seal motif (star), which mutates into a jasmine blossom. Woman ́s Robe melhafa with footprints of desert animals and fish motif, Marazig, Douz, Southern Tunisia, 1995, 396 x 124 cm, MVD 73725 doi 10.32873/unl.dc.tsasp.0027 The old Tifinagh script symbol for “Z” is turned into a dancer, or simply into the footprint of a dove, on a women’s wrap-around robe worn by the Feija in Morocco. Woman ́s wrapper haik with dancing figures, Erkoune in Feija area, Southern Morocco, around 1900, 462 x 147 cm, Collection Annette Korolnik Left: Tifinagh script symbol for „Z“, detail of haik, Erkoune in Feija area Right: Dancing figures, detail of haik, Erkoune in Feija area Another ancient Libyan symbol corresponding to the letter “D” is transformed into a weaving comb, mschot, in south Tunisian textiles. The names given to many motifs can often be traced to animals, plants or objects that are familiar and useful, such as “camel,” “palm,” “corn,” “scissors,” “comb,” or “tent.” 8 The representation of this modified symbol on the wedding robe is presumably a reference to the agoual, a dance of the Feija, Annette Korolnik-Andersch and Marcel Korolnik, Die Farbe Henna. Bemalte Textilien aus Süd-Marokko (Stuttgart: Arnoldsche, Art Publishers, 2002), 27, 105. doi 10.32873/unl.dc.tsasp.0027 Right: Flatwoven rug klim, Central plateau, Gafsa, Tunisia, around 1950, 200 x 300 cm, MVD 72788 The individual, creative and often highly abstract textile works of art can be interpreted as reflections of practical everyday life and also of their makers’ yearnings and desires. However, they can be read in many different ways and arouse different thoughts and dreams in every observer. A shimmering red surface on a Rehamna knotted carpet can be associated with a striving for light and the sun; it is as if one can feel the heat and observe a sunset. The blue and black colours evoke the atmosphere of an impending thunderstorm, with the promise of refreshing rain and pleasant coolness. Left: Carpet, Rehamna, Plains around Marrakech, Haouz region, Morocco, 1930-40, 235 x 410 cm, Right: Carpet, Beni M ́Guild, Middle Atlas, Morocco, 1925-35, 215 x 130 cm, both Collection Annette Korolnik doi 10.32873/unl.dc.tsasp.0027 All these wonderful textiles have practical functions, of course, but at the same time they are expressions of art. Especially in modified techniques and materials (recycled fabrics), which often have strong and flamboyant “wild” colours and compositions, they constitute innovations and reveal creative adaptation to changed conditions. As individual and expressive creations, they were discovered by textile lovers decades ago and have been collected as works of art. This has inspired many women, particularly in Morocco, to produce the same fabrics for sale as those intended for their own use. The value and charm of these textiles is not the rigid preservation of traditions, but rather the power of resilience and repositioning while consciously coming to terms with new influences under the rapidly changing conditions of everyday life. With unbridled creativity, the weavers, knotters and dyers from the Maghreb continue today to create textiles featuring highly formalised, abstract symbols that have a profound meaning, as they have long done in the past. It is an art consisting of symbols and colours. And they create works of art both as intuitive and as carefully thought out expressions of all dimensions of the human spirit and all shades of the human soul. The textile art produced by women in the Maghreb reflects something fundamental: the act of creation in life and in spirit, which manifests itself in constant motion and never-ending narrative.

Fish in the desert – North Africa’s textile tradition between indigenous identity and exogenous shifts in meaning