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Textiles and Art


© Lili Pintea-Reed

Mar 18, 2000


Textiles and Art
by Lili Pintea-Reed

Part of the supression of women has been the pervasive lie that women lack visual-spatial skills. This is partially based on the fact that young boys and young girls have differential developmemt in verbal and spatial skills at very young ages. Young boys stack blocks and build structures more often then young girls. Young girls have better fine motor control at an early age as evidenced by superior hand writing and skill at other fine tasks. Most parents of young children notice these things.

However, by the teens these differences even out. When one a standard IQ test is administered, there is a built in assumption that gifted people of either gender have both finely developed verbal skills and spatial abilities. They literally have all their wits about them, being both right and left brained. That having full command of both modalities gives us survival advantage seems obvious.

In most cultures the women construct the shelters in which people live and cloth their families. They do all this simply "by eye," or the use of body-based measuring. There are literally thousands, perhaps millions, of examples of textile art created by women.

In cultures where women were to focus attention on home and family textiles became thier chief mode of artistic expression. Perhaps it is not surprising that the most wonderful textiles are those made by women in cultures where they are the most oppressed, or where conventional art was the craft of men.

Below are a list of sites from around the world which demonstrate some of the wonderful artistis talent of women from all over the world.

Textile Sites

  • Australian Basketry and Textiles of INDIA
  • Peruvian Textiles
  • Japanese Textiles
  • Batik Links
  • Berber Carpets Weaving
  • Chinese Textiles
  • African Kente Cloth
  • Textiles of Thailand
  • Textiles of Laos
  • British Isles Wool

    Enjoy the experience of art from some of our sisters from around the world. There are many more to view all over the NET. Add some to your favorites.

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    The copyright of the article Textiles and Art in Fiber Arts is owned by Lili Pintea-Reed. Permission to republish Textiles and Art in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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    Here's the follow-up discussion on this article: View all related messages
    2.   Mar 26, 2000 11:41 AM
    I think I make a good point here. There is a weird premise in psychology that men are superior to women in visual spatial skills. I find this strange as the highest percentage of crafters are women. ...

    -- posted by pinteareed
    1.   Mar 22, 2000 12:43 PM
    We know women have to work extra-hard to get the same recognition as men, even in our supposedly "free" cultural environment here in the U.S. I say this in a general tone; I'm not trying to be biased ...

    -- posted by jerrib



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