Natural dyes vs natural dyes

Hi

I have been collecting antique textiles for around 5 years now.

As a beginner, I think many are driven by an obsession with avoiding pieces with synthetic dyes. To find a piece with ALL NATURAL dyes is the ultimate !! This proves age, quality, desirability, etc.

It took me years, and the much appreciated advice from a couple of extremely experienced collectors to show me that one has to look carefully at the QUALITY of the dyes, be they natural or not.

There are reds and there are reds. There are weak dyes, strong dyes, deeply saturated dyes, garish dyes, etc.

I only wish that more emphasis was placed on colour quality and colour harmony. I sometimes look at a couple of all naturally dyed pieces I own and think "Why is this piece so ordinary?"

The answer? Poor natural dyes, and/or a poor choice of colour combination.


Regards
Richard Tomlinson

Hi Richard,

I'm in this for 25 years now and I'm always astonnished by others that claim they can see what I can't.

I think most colors we see in our rugs are synthetic.

Best regards,
Vincent

Hi Vincent -

If the universe of rugs you are considering includes both those that have been "collected" and those that are usually called "decorative," I think there's no question that synthetics are overwhelmingly the more frequent.

But if one restricted one's self to rugs that were "collected" do you still feel that most dyes (if tested) would turn out to be wholly or partly synthetic?

As you have seen, I am in the group that questions whether the possible natural dye palette may not be wider than the current experts believe, but if it is the narrower palette being applied, I wonder if in fact most collected rugs (putting aside categories like Moroccan and Navajo and some others) might not be naturally dyed.

I don't think we can do it accurately, but the tendency is to be quite conservative. I think we are excluding natural dyed pieces that we should be considering for collection. That would seem to leave a margin for error and make relative success in avoiding synthetic dyes (of course sometimes we fail) more likely.

What do you think about this "collected" group?

Regards,

R. John Howe

Hi Vincent

I'm not sure I follow you.

My point is that people generally seem to place a higher value on naturally dyed pieces. That's the USP used in marketing so many textiles these days.

What some people don't do is look at the quality of those natural dyes.

As beginners, we 'jump' at pieces that are 100% vegetal, often without actually considering if the dyes are as good as one might find in other pieces.

I'd rather own a superbly dyed piece with one synthetic colour in it (depending on how hot it is), than an average dyed piece that is all naturally dyed.


Regards
Richard Tomlinson

Hi Richard,

The point here is: how do you know that your piece is “all naturally dyed”?
It’s because you trust the seller that says so or you trust what you see? Or both?

Regards,

Filiberto

Hi filiberto

thanks - i understand that.

i was just making another point about natural dyes(perceived or actual ). perhaps it is off the track a little, but i thought i'd just slip it in

as to recognition, if the dyes i think natural are indeed synthetic, then it only adds strength to my argument that we should be more concerned with quality of dyes, regardless of their origin.

and if there is possibly a wider range of natural dyes than we thought, then the same argument goes.

perhaps i am chasing my tail......

regards
richard tomlinson

Hi Richard

I think it's important to bear in mind that people look at the colors on a rug for at least two reasons:
1. Aesthetics.
2. Date attribution.

Age and monetary value are highly correlated in Rugdom, so being able to accurately distinguish natural from synthetic dye colors has a significant impact on our ability to make good decisions about whether a piece is priced attractively.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi Vincent,

Quote:
"I'm in this for 25 years now and I'm always astonnished by others that claim they can see what I can't.

I think most colors we see in our rugs are synthetic."

As John Howe already wondered, what rugs are you referring to?

And the obvious question now is :
How can you, with expierenced eyes, detect a synthetic color in a rug?

Regards,

Rob.

Hi Rob

I think the question you asked is exactly the one with which Vincent is most concerned. Most dealers and collectors of antique rugs feel pretty confident in their ability to identify natural dyes by eye, that their experience in doing so has given them that ability.

We know (or think we know) what we have been taught. The reliability of our knowledge is no better than that of the sources from which we learned. Most of us have been taught to recognize natural and synthetic dyes by other collectors and/or dealers.

How sound is their knowledge? My guess is that it's pretty good, but I don't know of a single person whose reliability as an "Experienced Eye" has been objectively tested. It is likely that "experienced eyes" make errors of two kinds:
1. Falsely identifying natural dyes as being synthetic, and
2. Falsely identifying synthetic dyes as being natural.

It would be enormously useful to know how often each kind of error is made, and I have outlined one kind of study that would provide the answers. It would not be inexpensive, since it involves a significant number of dye analyses, bringing a number of the rugs from which samples were analyzed to a major convention of ruggies, and having a booth from which the study would be run. Until that (or something comparable) has been done, we have no way to know how trustworthy "experienced eyes" really are.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi Steve,

-It seems to me it wouldn't be to difficult to organize a small test-case here on turkotek. You just need about 30 random picked (old-antique) rugs, together with a detail image, and two groups of self-proclaimed appraisers: one expierenced and one unexperienced. During the voting the answers should be unavailable and only disclosed at the end. Would be fun.
B.t.w. the argument that the colors seen would be depending on the setting of the individual monitor will not intrude the outcome because this is true for both groups.

-My question to Vincent was not intended to be hypothetical, but concrete.
What is the meaning of his statement that most colors in our rugs are synthetic?

Regards,

Rob.

Hi Rob

The first laboratory synthesis of a dye was reported in 1858, and commercialization of synthetic dyes began pretty soon after that. Synthetics were in use within tribal and rustic societies in western and central Asia by 1870. This means that even if we know that a rug is more than 100 years old (and, obviously, it would have to be known by some criterion other than eyeball analysis of the dyes), it could have synthetic dyes in it. This makes it more difficult to generate the samples without doing dye analyses on them.

I also think monitor calibration would be needed to do this on line. Answering the two important questions, (how often does an experienced collector or dealer mistake a natural for a synthetic dye, and how often does he/she do the opposite), seem to me to require that the participants are able to see the colors pretty accurately. How does the comparison with the results from a group of inexperienced people solve this if color rendition isn't accurate?

The few people who have actually done analyses on dyes in a large number of rugs (Paul Mushak, for instance) might already have the rugs with which to test the accuracy of the participants. This would at least bypass one expensive step - performing chemical analysis on lots of sample of lots of rugs.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi all,

There are to aspects of this thread that I would like to emphasize. As a relative amateur when it comes to date attribution and "spotting" natural (or "un-natural") dyes, I am struck by how often those who are more experienced have substantive disagreements about the age and attribution of rugs. I also am intrigued by how often experienced collectors say something like "the dyes look all natural to me, so it must be made prior to...."

Here are a few questions from a novice.

1. How much certainty is there with respect to the correlation of natural dyes and dates?

2. For which colours and rug types do these rules apply most reliably?

3. To what degree are visual dye assessments influenced by date assessments? ("this design shows real age, so colours must be natural...")

Since my training is in quantitative sciences, I really like the proposition of a scientific test of at least the reliability of experts in both date attribution and the assessment of dyes. Although accuracy would require a gold standard (like laboratory testing of dyes), reliability testing only entails an assessment of how much agreement there is among experts (or non-experts). This type of experiment is not without potential biases though, since there is already a strong consensus that has developed based on frequent interactions among experts. So it would be necessary to take a sample of rugs or fragments for which there is no clear a priori agreement about age.

Okay, enough with the science. In the end, I tend to agree with Richard that in most cases it is the quality of dyes and dyeing that matters most in the aesthetic characteristic of a rug. Unless one is dealing with a question of "really old", aesthetics trump all else for me. I still think that after a while even a novice can clearly see the difference between a beautifully dyed rug and an ordinary one, regardless of whether the dyes are natural or not.

Cheers,

James.

Hi James

Let me start with your final comment, about aesthetics being primary. As long as market value isn't an issue, I agree 100%. I can appreciate the aesthetics of a rug that includes synthetic dyes, I just don't want to pay the price of an antique for it.

We had a mini-Salon on the topic of date attribution criteria and their reliability a few months ago; here is a link to it:
http://www.turkotek.com/mini_salon_00005/salon.html

To get to your specific questions:

1. How much certainty is there with respect to the correlation of natural dyes and dates?

2. For which colours and rug types do these rules apply most reliably?

3. To what degree are visual dye assessments influenced by date assessments?

Since synthetic dyes didn't exist before 1858, we can be 100% sure that a rug with a synthetic dye in it couldn't have been made any earlier than that (if we assume that the synthetic color is original, not part of a restoration). Synthetics became pretty common in western and central Asian rugs by the end of the 19th century; it is common to see palettes that include many tip-faded synthetics in the same piece during the period of roughly 1925 to 1940. Some weaving groups, most notably Belouch, were still using natural dyes and handspun wool for almost everything they wove right until about 1940.

Since the Experienced Eye method of dye analysis is, for all practical purposes, a modern example of transmission of information through the oral tradition route, experienced collectors and dealers can agree on whether a particular specimen is natural or synthetic and their unanimity adds no more reliability to the opinion than the opinion of any one of them. A shared mythology is still a collection of myths, and unanimity of belief in that myth is not compelling evidence that it is correct.

Regards

Steve Price

Dear Steve,

I agree that paying a premium for an antique, and buying a rug that is aesthetically pleasing are not necessarily the same thing (though for novices like me, it doesn't make much sense to buy an antique rug that is unappealing). Your "rules of thumb" in terms of when and where you find natural dyes (or don't find them) seem to be pretty widely accepted. But unless we have an accurate and reliable way to date rugs at these critical inflection points you mention, we are confronted with a rather intractable conundrum.... "this rug is old, and therefore has natural dyes ==> since it has natural dyes, it is probably old".

I agree with you that having experts agree doesn't mean that they are right, but there seems to be a better than even chance that they will be. But I still see much evidence of disagreement among experienced collectors. Perhaps it would be interesting to study those areas of disagreement more systematically to try to understand the main sources of disagreement, and work from there. Perhaps most relevant to this topic, it would be interesting to study the circumstances in which assessment of the source of dyes causes the least agreement.

Cheers,

James.

Unanimity Myth

Hi Steve,

Such a reliability test would have three outcomes:

1. There is no significant consensus between experts, compared to non-experts.

2.There is a significant consensus between experts, compared to the non-experts, with uncertainty about its correctness.

3.There is a significant consensus between experts, compared to non-experts, with certainty about its correctness by means of chemical testing.

Such a test as I proposed is not about the last outcome, but is about #1 and #2.
If #1 is the outcome, there is no need going to the next step at all, as there will be no hypothesis left to go for chemical testing.

It will be a method to know if this supposed unanimity among experts is realy true or not.

Regards,

Rob.

Hi Rob

Thanks for the clarification. You're right; I missed your point the first time.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi Rob,

"-My question to Vincent was not intended to be hypothetical, but concrete.
What is the meaning of his statement that most colors in our rugs are synthetic?"

It means:
Most colors in our rugs are synthetic.
I think a color can be natural.
I think a color can be synthetic.
But the probability that it is synthetic is 80% because the time span is 130 years.

Why?
I've seen the "experts" change from soft, gentle color appreciation in the seventies/eighties into big color appreciation in the nineties etc.
Did the rugs change? No.
The market changed so the experts changed their tune.

Best regards,
Vincent

Hi Vincent,

And your tune will firmly stay sweet and pointless.

Best regards,

Rob.

Hi Rob,

For some, yes.
Not for me.

Best regards,
Vincent