Dear folks -

The Textile Museum's Symposium, held October 19-21, 2007 did deal heavily with clothing and costume.

At some point I will be able to show you some aspects of the ending "show and tell."

The basic thrust of the symposium on "collecting" seemed to be to suggest that we should re-examine and expand some of the traditional boundaries that have framed our collecting interests.

We were confronted with contemporary, not just older objects . And modern designs, color palettes and even materials were "show-cased."

Dan Walker, the TM Director, is probably right that some reconsideration of the "horizons" that currently delineate the "collectible" for us is in order.

But I remain not entirely convinced.

I was seated at one Symposium luncheon table with a group that included one lady would held forth strongly on this need to reconsider our textile "boundaries." She said that she was herself a textile craftsperson. I asked what she was currently working with/on. She answered that she was knitting and crocheting silk and steel.

I said, "I don't think I want to feel that." Perhaps I misunderstand.

More later, with photos.

Regards,

R. John Howe

Did you hear that right?

John,

Maybe you did not hear her correctly.

She probably said silk and "chenille", which rhymes with "steel".

Or maybe you were attending, instead of the TM conference, the S&M conference.


Patrick Weiler

Hi John

The basic thrust of the symposium on "collecting" seemed to be to suggest that we should re-examine and expand some of the traditional boundaries that have framed our collecting interests.

What a bizarre suggestion. Among the essential elements of collector neurosis is that it places constraints on the objects being collected. As long as the collector is hurting nobody, the notion that some forms of the neurosis are morally or intellectually superior to others strikes me as absurd. Collectors are often advised to focus their collecting rather narrowly in order to achieve excellence and a high level of connoisseurship. I think it's good advice, even though I don't follow it.

Steve Price

Hi Pat -

My ability to hear is always in play when I report anything, including what the TV says about today's weather, but I think I got the "steel and silk" right.

There were folks working with very unusual materials. Just off the top of my head, there was a dress decorated with thousands of birth control pills, a jacket, the elaborate designs on which had been formed by pinning onto a ground frabric thousands of brass safety pins, and another piece woven from shredded one dollar bills. One dress was made with seeming translucent "paste-like" (as in jewelry "paste") pieces that the owner said would actually disolve in water. There were a number of people said to be weaving using paper.

I've found since I wrote my previous post above that I can give you visual glimpse of aspects of some of the program lectures.

An early lecture was by Harold Koda, Curator in Charge, Costume Institute, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Mr. Koda talked about the Institute's collecting of high fashion costume and said that they have shifted from donations by wealthy women of dresses, etc. that such donors have bought themselves, to buying items directly from the designers.

Here is a link to some of the pieces in the Met's Costume Institute collection:

http://www.metmuseum.org/Works_of_Art/department.asp?dep=8

From what was shown, it seemed that "costume" is defined quite narrowly at the Institute, although I don't know the actual range of the collection.

An interesting afternoon lecture was by Julie Schaefer Dale, the owner of a NYC gallery of art and craft. She spoke on "On the Body, Off the Wall, Collecting Art to Wear."

I used to buy my wife what we called "Bill Cosby" sweaters. Sweaters that seemed similar to the luxurious pieces he wore on one of his TV series. The material Ms. Dale presented was like "Bill Cosby" sweaters (and coats, etc.) to the third power.

You can see the sort of thing she showed at this link for her gallery:

http://www.julieartisans.com/wearable_art2.htm

A third lecturer, Titi Halle is also the owner of a gallery and spoke on "Back to the Future: Collecting 20th Century Textiles." This lecture seemed pretty directly aligned with Dan Walker's current exhibition of Austrian textiles that we have drawn attention to previously. Here is a link to Ms. Halle's gallery:

http://www.coraginsburg.com/

She carries a variety of things, but the 20th century textiles were her subject at the Symposium.

Hope that makes some aspects of the Symposium a little more concrete for those interested.

Regards,

R. John Howe

Dear folks -

I don't want to leave the impression that there was something strongly normative or moralistic about the orientation of the Textile Museum's just completed symposium.

It was, rather, an exposure to collecting of different sorts. Newer material WAS accented (although early 20th century material is legitimately "antique" now by the most usually applied standand of 100 years). But high fashion collecting, the collecting of "craft" (much of which, in the presentation by two Washington area craft collectors, included textiles but was not limited to them) "wearable art and designer fabrics intended for either furniture or clothing, did take up the bulk of the lecture program. There was only one presentation (Jim Burns on rug collecting) that had what most of us would see as a more traditional orientation to our own interests.

I am not sure that I can portray accurately any particular "message" that the TM may have been interested to send to collectors, but there are a couple of possible sources of such a program that are visible.

The first is the concern for institutional survival. A number of us here have likely heard Dan Walker talk about "where are the next generation of collectors to come from?". I heard him say this at the ACOR in Boston. There was a responding titter in the audience, to which he said, "I'm not kidding! Look around this room. Where are the younger people?" So I think this is one source of concern. If the rug and collectors like ourselves are not reproduced in the next couple of generations, what impact will this have on small museums like the TM which seemingly sharply focused agendas? So I suspect that there is a "searching" for the potential interests of the next generations of collectors. When I asked Michael Seidman, who is always master of ceremony of the show and tell that ends the TM symposium what sorts of things I should bring this time, he said "We need "flash." I think that reflects this same concern. The interest in being relevant to the likely interests (I suspect we're in fact badly placed for trying to predict this) of the next generation of textile collectors.

A second phenomenon, of which the TM may be a current example, was likely portrayed in the opening lecture in this years Symposium. Neil Harris, an art history professor from the University of Chicago, talked about "Art Collecting as a Social Experience." For me his title does not convey well the center of gravity of his talk.

Harris' lecture was mostly descriptively historical, but one of the first things I wrote in my notes on it was that "institutional collecting often starts with an individual whose original vision often (usually?) disappears over time."

So far, it seems to me, The Textile Museum has oriented itself pretty closely with Mr. Myers' own vision of collecting. But Dan Walker was clearly brought in as a director likely to have good ideas and it seems to me that one of his good ideas visible so far is that more modern textiles are legitimate foci for TM exhibitions and collections. He has established a relationship with Rebecca Stevens as a Consulting Curator, Contemporary Textiles, and she has curated at least three exhibitions to date.

Textiles younger than earlier 20th century were very visible in this symposium. It will be interesting to see how things develop.

Regards,

R. John Howe

This is a not very well thought out contribution to the issue of collecting horizons. Yes, the idea of collecting is to have some focus or boundaries. But my impression is that the speakers John has described were suggesting redefinition of boundaries to include new approaches to textile design and fabrication. Thus, individuals may have more foci to choose from and may even find that objects they have been drawn to are conferred with a new, "collectible" legitimacy (which may sound odd, but even the most adventuresome can take comfort from knowing that the strange things they've long loved have become recognized as worth collecting -- even when it brings in new competition for good pieces).
Another thing, about the age cohort of collectors. I know that some collectors start very young -- often if they grew up with parents that collected important objects. But I suspect that people who don't start out organically, so to speak, begin collecting after they've achieved some other material goals in life. Even in contemporary art, which is relatively attractive to young collectors, the urge doesn't kick in until a certain amount of sorting out is achieved: then it becomes time to achieve a new level of material status -- which could involve textiles woven from steel and silk. Consider, too, contemporary weavers, who are caught between craft tradition and an awareness of the need to transcend tradition and somehow innovate.
To put it another way, how old were all you Turkotekkers when you started collecting, I mean, seriously?

Janet -

No one is responding to your thoughts above on collecting nor has anyone answered your specific question.

I think your observation about the fact that "collectors" are not necessarily "born young," so to speak, and that we might better look for emerging collectors in somewhat older brackets is perceptive.

But, for me, the problem Dan Walker points to, doesn't go away that easily. Scanning older cohorts as well, I do not discern many emerging rug and textile collectors in the DC area. I frequent the TM rug mornings and am visible enough that I am pointed out to newer people frequently as a convenient contact for joining our local rug club. I get fairly few requests for membership information for the club and, although, I don't have precise numbers, think that the number of our local rug club members is declining.

Part of this phenomena may be connected to the seeming fact that people "decorate" differently nowadays and that an oriental rug is not necessarily an item frequently obtained as folks become more affluent (this may be important since the buying of a decorative oriental rug or textile was frequently the first move most of us made that resulted in our becoming collectors). So I think this traditional entry point has largely been lost.

It would be interesting to attempt to identify emerging rug and textile collectors nowadays and to map a bit how they are incurring their affliction.

Now to answer your question for myself. Your word "serious" is difficult to fathom because I'm not sure what it points at so I'll tussle it in what follows.

I'm 71 and think I first saw myself as a collector in the WWII years. This status was thrust upon me by a little old neighbor lady who gave me three old American coins and by an uncle who brought back lots of German coins. Despite not volunteering, I took on my collector status fairly seriously and did try, without much success, to add to this initial collection.

Another early root of my current collecting is likely sourced in the fact that my mother was a good seamstress, and also knitted, crocheted and indulged in minor crafts, like making hats or teddy bears, all of her life. I think there was a time when, as a child, I could knit and crochet at some level.

About age 12 I went away to a summer camp and learned how to plait plastic gymp. I was good at this and both taught at the camp and came home with all of the gymp in the camp store and tied lots of lanyards and bracelets and explored the various plaiting weaves in an initial way. I was more craftsman than collector, but had a considerable array of items for some time.

Then in high school I worked in a clothing store and became, in truth, a kind of "clothes collector" (I took 155 shirts with me to my first semester of college). I learned to admire good cloth and had tailored suits and sport coats (one of which I still have).

In the 70's we wanted to decorate our house partly with plants and I got interested in making macrame plant hangers. Macrame is very democratic. If you like tying the next knot you can get pretty good pretty rapidly. So again I went through a period of about 7 years during which I tied knots seriously. And I not only tied, but also bought things from other knotters whose work I admired.

Then in the 80s with our kids grown up, we moved to the city, and after awhile decided that maybe we'd give up the Scandanavian furniture we had and become "city" people with more "antique" furnishings. This, of course, led to our first oriental rug, an 8 X 10 Indio-Bijar. After that, it was pretty much downhill, as I came in contact with both a local rug club and the Textile Museum. Simultaneously, my wife, a collie breeder and exhibitor, who could no longer have lots of dogs in a one-bedroom condo, began to collect a wide variety of collie artifacts.

So to go back to your word "serious," there were traces of "collecting" activities at lots of stages, but it may be that both my wife and I really emerged as more "serious" collectors in our 50s. That would seem to confirm your suspicion.

Regards,

R. John Howe

Hi All

One of our early Salons dealt with why collectors collect. Here is a link to it. How and when the collector neuroses surfaced comes up in the discussion.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi John,

155 shirts? The dorm room I had in the first year of college wouldn't hold 155 shirts. Wow.

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Rich Larkin

Hi Rich -

Yes, it's an obscene number.

Of course, in those days I changed shirts at least three times a day.

My parents went away for almost a month (I started in summer school) and when I presented my mother with over 100 shirts for washing and ironing, she introduced me to the local laundry service. Even at 25 cents each, it was a very large laundry bill I had to "eat."

There was, in this set of shirts, one that I wish I still had. It was a very delicate, pearl-gray, French batiste, with French cuffs and a pin collar and deep front pleats turned out as on a formal dress shirt. It was perhaps the most sumptuous shirt I have ever owned and in 1953 I paid the outrageous price of $7 for it.

Regards,

R. John Howe

Hi John,

I know we aren't supposed to discuss prices on TurkoTek; but I can't resist commmenting that not the least remarkable fact about that episode for you was the terrific deal you got on the laundering of that French batiste shirt for twenty five cents. It was starched and ironed, I presume.

Incidentally, dovetailing with the collecting theme, and answering Janet's rhetorical question, I got bit with the rug collecting bug in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in 1966. The only entertainment in town was the souq on Thursdays and Fridays, and you know the rest. My first purchase was a small prayer rug from Afghanistan that I no longer own, and good thing, too, as it would have had the potential to start a veritable firestorm here on TurkoTek as to provenance. (M. U. D.? I didn't even know how to say that back then.) My next was a modest, somewhat worn 3' x 5' Qashqai with somber coloring, but which I still have and to which I am sentimentally attached. I have $11.00 in that one. It is sitting in the mud room in front of the washing machine.

I had some shirts made by the same tailors who make the white thobes for the Saudis. They didn't come out all that bad. I got them laundered by a family of brothers from Yemen for ten cents per shirt.

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Rich Larkin

Its cloudy today in Dubai !!

I still get my shirts ironed for 25 cents and last year, holidaying in Oman, that was complete laundry and delivery service :-)


And there is still a great souk here for Central Asian textiles...the carpets are pretty well full retail but there are plenty of nice clothing and embroidery pieces still about.

Johanna

Hi Johanna,

I hope I'm not diverting the thread. My comment may fall within the broad notion of collecting.

When I lived in Riyadh, the most common pile rug item in the souq was from the Shiraz area. The new stock in the 1960's was about as horrific as rugs get; very coarse, unpleasing wool, and garish synthetic colors. However, it was possible to find nice older stuff. Astonishingly enough, the dealers there looked at used rugs pretty much they would have looked at used clothing: There might be a market for the merchandise, but it shouldn't be too expensive.

In retrospect, I would say the older rugs were recognizable and familiar South Persian tribal goods as I understand that genre today, but the proportion of specific types was different than I am used to in the western markets. I assumed the prevalence of the various types to be a function of the location of Shiraz relative to Riyadh, and that the rugs had found a familiar route over the years across the gulf. Anyway, I wonder if you have a sense of what makes up the bulk of the Dubai rug market in terms of Persian rugs? Is there a significant trade in older rugs? Do outsiders prowl the souq for these things (i. e., older rugs)?

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Rich Larkin

Mecca Shiraz

Rich,

I have never been to Saudi Arabia or Iran, but I own a rug described by the seller (an Iranian from the Shiraz area) as a Mecca Shiraz. The story is that pilgrims from the Shiraz area would bring their finer rugs on their pilgrimage to sell in order to support themselves along the way.
Filiberto has encountered many pilgrims in Jordan selling rugs in the local market on their way to Mecca, so this preponderance of Shiraz rugs in Saudi Arabia (Shiraz being closer than the Caucasus) is certainly credible.

Patrick Weiler

Hi Pat,

From what I've seen of the pieces retrieved from hajjis over the years, I would say that the finer rugs rarely show up through that process. That may have been the case prior to the Persian Gulf oil boom, but the larger (and older) trade in carpets is along the Trucial Coast of the gulf in what is now the UAE and in Bahrain.

There days, those that make it as far as Jeddah & Mecca are typically picked off by immigrant rug merchants or the odd wealthy Saudi or fortunate expat (as Filiberto was) who happens to be hunting there. In twenty years, I found one late 19th century Yomud rug that was worth throwing a little money at.

Several Persian families have establishments in Bahrain, Dubai, and Sharjah, as well as several wealthy Afghan dealers. They control much of the rug trade in the region. People pretty much understand that their pipelines are a faster, better bet toward rug revenue. These folks also have family members in the Canada and the US, who move the goods through North America.

The "Opies" of the world are few and far between, and have beem smart in establishing relationships with these trading and manufacturing families.

One can certainly find a lot of interesting Shirazi rugs around the Gulf, most of which are done with very poor quality dyes. But, a true ethographer would not be so concerned with that, because it is representative of the state of affairs at the time the piece was made.

These days, most of the stuff coming out of the hajji rout is pretty poor; the Afghans figured out a long time ago that the Arab world has pretty low expectations and a taste that runs toward more "non-traditional" color combinations. I think Filiberto would probably agree with that view.

The better dealers in Saudi Arabia, and around the Gulf (including Iran) always have a back room, or a closed storage cabinet, where the really good stuff is.

The crucial thing to remember is that many of the best rugs from the region, especially the older ones, have already been removed to Germany, the UK, Italy, or Russia, a long time ago.

Regards,
Chuck Wagner

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Chuck Wagner

Dear folks -

Just in case you have not been tempted to explore the links on Julie Dale's site, let me put a couple of them here "in your face" so to speak.

The first is on the work of Linda Mendelson. She is described as a loom knitter.

http://www.julieartisans.com/linda_mendelson2.htm

http://www.julieartisans.com/linda_mendelson3.htm

I find Ms. Mendelson's work more accessible.

The second is on the work of Daniel Storto, a glove artist

http://www.julieartisans.com/daniel_storto2.htm

Mr. Storto's work was among that Ms. Dale included in her slide-assisted talk. I think she said that each of these is a pair of "wearable" gloves.

Regards,

R. John Howe

Hi John

There's a link on each of those pages that says, "Contact us for more information on these items". That usually means that the items are for sale by the dealer running the exhibition. If that's the case, the links should not be on these pages. Lots of dealers have wonderful exhibitions of things that they have for sale, and we don't announce or link them except in the rare instances in which illustrative material for an ongoing discussion is otherwise unavailable.

Incidentally, although Saul has a few things for sale included in his exhibition, none of those are included or mentioned in the Salon essay.

Thanks.

Steve Price

Steve -

I suspect all of these items are in fact for sale.

I have no longer any sense of what our line between commercial and non-commercial is. It often seems nearly arbitrary, but perhaps I simply don't understand it.

But if any of the above is objectionable please take it down.

I was merely trying to give folks a concrete sense of the sorts of things that were presented at the TM's symposium.

There's nothing going on here excepting an attempt to be concrete.

I would have no objection if you took down the entire thread. I suspect that most of us have textile interests that move in other directions.

Regards,

R. John Howe

Hi John

Our line between promotional and nonpromotional is no different than it's been for the 9 years that we've been on line. We don't link to dealer sites except on our Links page, and we don't comment about dealers in ways that might reflect upon their stature as dealers. We periodically link to items that are for sale, when it's especially difficult to find illustrations for a point under discussion. I can understand the point of presenting a link to a dealer gallery in order to give readers the opportunity to see the sorts of things presented at the TM convention. Following it up three days later with more links to the same gallery ... in case you have not been tempted to explore ... let me put a couple of them here "in your face" ... seems to me to go well beyond that.

I'm kind of surprised that the TM allowed dealers to present their inventory at the annual convention. It was my impression that this was not permitted. Perhaps I was mistaken, perhaps their policy has changed.

Regarding removing this thread because it is not a mainstream topic for most collectors: we've never avoided having discussion threads (or Salons, for that matter) on topics well outside what we imagine to be the main interests of our readership, and I think it would be a mistake to do so.

Thanks.

Steve Price

Steve -

The commerical-non-commerical distinction, as administered, may be clear to you, but I find it utterly opaque. Probably just some limitation on my part.

I only made the subsequent post with the sub-links because the thread had moved tangentially (as threads tend to do) from the TM symposium material (which was itself a tangent from Saul's exhibition material, but related because it, too, is clothing and costume).

About the TM's relation to commerce, they now often hold what they call "shop events" at which dealers display, talk about and sell their work. So there is a sense in which some historical distinctions seem to have broken down somewhat.

I still have no problem if you want to take the entire thread down. I have no interest in promoting such material even tangentially.

Regards,

R. John Howe

To hijack this thread back to where we had hijacked it......

My impression of the 'carpet' market here in 'shopping mall hell' is there are two markets.
Mainly Local Arabs want new....and they can pay...for absolutely stunning iranian products. Old is not better here :-). Many places service this lucrative market and have an additional stock for us poorer folk, including better quality afghan and turkmen. Their idea of old is 1960's Hamdhan!

Then there is a market that has the aforementioned south persian rugs and a large variety of afghan products. Its is these places that the odd gem can be found...if you don't mind the bedbugs!
You soon can work out the shops owned by families with direct links back home. These are small scale dealers who happen to pick up the odd rare piece if they find it...most of them have links to Europe where that stuff goes, but sometimes it gets here. Normally it is sold on to one of the straight antique dealers aimed at the european tourist market.
One young man was telling me how, when he was on a buying trip with his father, he would get so embarrased because his dad was always asking hosts to buy their door mats! One was a saryk piece I passed on which is now commands a ridiculous price in a shopping mall! Its some of these guys that also have a good range of uzbek,turkmen,Lakai etc clothing items.
I'd say actually the best chances here are older baluch/afghan non rug items and also old qashqai rug from the Iranian shops. But its hard 'work'. The funniest thing is being offered the same thing from at least three different shops as they all work the client! I've since learned to save time by asking for one thing in one place and find that by the time I get two places down the shop boy there will already have dug out the sort of thing I want to look at .
Shopping heaven and shopping hell in one town ..there you go!

Johanna

Hi Johanna,

Yes, well, my wife is more inclined towards city rugs than country rugs, so we also know how to spell Nain, Esfahan, and Qom...

Regards,
Chuck Wagner

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Chuck Wagner

Hi Johanna,

Thanks a lot for that very interesting description of the market situation there. Dubai isn't Riyadh, and forty years have passed to boot; but at the same time, I have a sense of, "The more things change, the more they stay the same."

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Rich Larkin

Hello,
I read this thread with some interest as some of the experienced members of this community are talking about a qausi crisis in finding the next generation of collectors for tribal textiles. I have been interested in tribal rugs for about 10-12 years (I am in my early forties) and have collected off and on and think I sympathize with the other posters remarks. I realize threads sometimes drift off to other topics but I wonder if this is the place to talk about the issue of the looming lack of serious interest in collecting central asian textiles by younger folks. I wonder whether this community might see fit to start some sort of "panel" to look at how to address this in a practical manner. Obviously there are many dimensions to this, not the least of which is the commercial/non-commercial line in the sand that turkotek moderators have (quite appropriately in my mind) drawn.
I wonder if such a "panel" if assembled might think of some ways to make information 1)easier to get to, 2)less fractious and arcane) and 3)topical to a broader audience's life habits and information consuming habits.
I would consider my experience level with tribal rug collecting rather novice as opposed to those who publish on this site and I think it's a great resource. My purpose in commenting here is to say, "here I am, young collector, and I find this a very overwhelming topic, how can Turkotek help?"
There are certainly other diciplines, art forms, interest groups that find themselves in the same predicament. Big Opera houses for example distrubute content through movie theatres now as a way to "build their brand". I realize this metaphor only goes so far, but it's an example of innovation in order to help an industry. Yes, Turkotek is not commericial, but it seems like with all the INCREDIBLE knowledge and experience of its members, more could be done to bring information to would be collectors (ie. the less experienced ones such as myself) easier.
Maybe after 10 years, you guys have the experience to do something really terrific for the state of knowledge about textile collecting--we all know it does take active interest to push a community along, but if a project were started to help out folks in a systematic way it might 1)solidify the mission of a community such as turkotek, and 2)ultimately plant the seeds which would grow more collectors for the medium and long term.
Apologize in advance if I have spoken out of turn. I hope these suggestions will be taken in a positive and constructive spirit.
Thanks,
Doug

Hi Douglas

First, welcome. If you wouldn't mind, please send me your full name. I will add it to your post and will change your user name to include the family name along with your first name, so it will automatically display on your posts.

We kind of think of the existence of this site as fulfilling some of the objectives you mention, although we don't target the novice specifically. Bearing in mind that we operate on a shoestring, with no external sources of income, what would you propose as a constructive step in the direction of doing more for the novice? One thing that comes to my mind is to arrange for a Salon on the topic of how to encourage new collectors. Would you be interested in preparing a brief introductory essay for this?

Regards

Steve Price

collecting

Doug--

I have been noodling around in this rug world for 15 years, nothing like the more expert people here. What I have to say about this field comes from comparing it to other worlds in which I am more expert, and it may come out a little cynical and worthy of vigorous rebuttal from the more knowledgeable here.

The weird thing about collecting is that the tradition is that money is supposedly no object and you go to a trusted dealer and let that dealer set you up. You must purchase your education; that is the traditional path. But I have noticed that very few will show you the good stuff unless you demonstrate that you know what the good stuff is. I have found this even with absolutely trustworthy dealers, too (in their defense--why sell something to someone who won't appreciate it?). A dealer that I have bought a few things from complained that there are just not enough people willing to spend $20K plus on carpets anymore (which includes me). What is this world coming to?! The fact is that few people are going to be able to assemble that stunning collection of 200-year old Turkmen weavings, and for most of us the path must be a much more creative endeavor. Books, looking at weavings, making bad and good choices in acquiring them, asking knowledgeable people, cultivating the skills in your eyes and hands--what else can we do?

It is an endeavor made more complex because there are vast areas of inquiry dominated by a cloud of mystery. I often liken the world of weavings to the world of violin collecting, but without the vast amount of information we have about violin makers. We know virtually none of the artists who made these textile treasures; we barely know many of the cultures in which this tradition was cultivated, relying on the tarnished impressions of outsiders or the faded memories of descendants. It is like learning about the Lakota from General Custer. I imagine thousands of weavers in Paradise amused and annoyed at all of us trying to pontificate about their lives' work.

It is not a world of free exchange of information; it is more akin to an 18th-century concept of commerce than a free marketplace of knowledge and ideas we expect these days. Turkotek aspires to be this marketplace (which is why I find it so appealing) without the commerce, and I think it is revealing how many dealers and experts supposedly find the discourse here unseemly. Because there is so much not known about these lovely things that we obsess over, what knowledge there is becomes precious, and in the absence of information, pretense, rumor, and assumption are elevated in importance. Why not just give information away? Because there is money to be made. I have had dealers show me images that they specifically have told me to promise not to share, and there is the tedious practice of posting items for sale while not revealing the price. It is clear that with a few exceptions, the world of dealers sees limited value in educating the public, especially those of us who haunt the low-cost corners of the Internet waiting to pounce on the next treasure. They have to make a living.

I found this discussion of modern weavers complaining about us not being drawn to their work also intriguing. It reminds me of colleagues in music complaining about audiences preferring Bach to the godawful plink-plunk modernist stuff they get tenure with. If they were able to produce soulful music I think we would listen to it, but they have driven the Western music tradition into the ground. With these weavings, it was imperialism that drove them into the ground, and recapturing their world is impossible. In our intoxication with this beauty, I believe we express our craving for what we have lost.

Paul

Hi Paul

First, one correction: I think you greatly overestimate the general level of expertise among our participants. There are a few genuine experts, and a great many who are genuine experts in SOMETHING and can occasionally bring it to bear on matters of rugs. But enthusiasm and expertise are very different things (as I'm sure you know).

Your take on the culture of Rugdom is probably pretty accurate, and isn't at all peculiar to it. The world of tribal arts is similar in most ways.

It's good (for me) to know that a professional musician sees contemporary art and music through the same eyes and ears as I do. I'd emphasize the exceptions, though. Richard Farber composes music that is clearly modern but so accessible that even my son (whose idea of good music usually sounds to me like recordings made inside a crowded train as it crashed into a mountainside) enjoys it. If you haven't heard "Five and a Half", don't delay. But I also remember visiting an exhibition at the National Gallery some years ago where what I thought (from a distance) was the best canvas in the room turned out to be a dark wood door with a brushed steel doorknob.

Regards

Steve Price

Hello Paul, Steve, and all,

I think there is a difference between modern productions (weavings and music both) and the older material.

The older material we know is (mostly) what has survived a considerable period of vetting by our forbears; they have winnowed out the kernels of wheat from the immensity of chaff. The lesser pieces have been discarded or forgotten. For every J. S. Bach I suspect there were a goodly number of P. D. Q. Bachs.

For the modern productions we must do the winnowing ourselves. There do exist excellent modern weavings - probably not in the classic Turkmen style - but they are intermixed with a superfluity of hackwork. Similarly, I think Steve Reich's music will be with us for a long time; that of many other contemporary composers will probably not last beyond their debuts.

Lloyd Kannenberg

not to go too far into the music thing, but...

Steve and Lloyd, et al--

I didn't intend to elaborate on the music analogy, but I should say that I am a composer, actually, and so my discussion was reflecting my own (perhaps twisted) personal agenda in my field.

Of course there is wonderful new music in the "art" music scene, but in the climate of academic modernism (that has managed to turn even post-modernism into modernism), the emphasis is on a kind of elitist individualism that is deliberate in its lack of concern for audience. Personally, I find the institution of peer review to be an unqualified disaster in the arts. With Bach and other 18th-century artists, they created their work within a context in which the basic language was appealing to a large audience, which is why even the least among them made work which is at least pleasant--the collective style was based on an aesthetic appreciated by many. We may bow down to Mozart, but Salieri wasn't so bad either. The closest musical analog we have now is the world of popular music, in which even the worst must reach an audience and thus there is a guarantee of basic quality. Another, perhaps more accurate, comparison is within living traditions of oral tradition "folk" music where individual excellence is acknowledged only within a context of preferences of a large community of listeners and musicians.

The 18th-c. European musical community (and popular and folk music communities) is thus not unlike the world of traditional rug weaving. The basic style was based on a collaborative aesthetic made not by the imagination of one individual, but the collective effort of thousands of artists and their audiences. It should not be surprising that we are drawn to this work over things created by isolated artists trying to impress a handful of other isolated artists.

Paul

Paul -

I take your point! When I said "we must do the winnowing", I meant we, the (mostly non-musician, mostly non-weaving) audience. Peer review is an imperfect tool even in my field (physics), as I can attest from having been on both sides of the reviewing process.

Lloyd Kannenberg

Hi Doug and Paul,

I've been meaning to comment on your posts about collecting. Doug, are you talking about textile collecting in very broad terms (including such things as clothing, et al), or more narrowly in the usual TurkoTek vein? Beyond that, I am hard pressed to know how TurkoTek can do more than it is doing, given the size and scope of the operation. Keeping in mind that the "information" out there must always be taken advisedly, one can spend a lifetime tracking down all the links, and links from links, etc. Even the commercial sites are linked out, notwithstanding TurkoTek's policies.

Regarding the mainline material on the daily posts, it becomes clear to the steady reader that the dissemination of information and opinions on TurkoTek isn't likely to become less fractious anytime soon. Good thing too. My advice to the novice collector is, a) handle as many rugs as possible, and b) take everything you hear with a grain of salt.

Paul, I am always interested in how eager collectors go about looking for what they want. As you suggest, financial considerations are inevitably important. If money is no object, one can choose among a large range of options. For the less well supplied, it is necessary to be creative, and also to cut back on one's expectations. For my own part, when I was actively seeking rugs, my strategy was to find "sleepers" that the professional rug buying fraternity would ignore. This necessitated looking to types that were undervalued that I judged to have intrinsic merit. I found that Baluch and Kurd rugs filled that bill for me. Of course, when the big hitters hit the auction house, I was out of the running. I recall a Caucasian pictorial rug with what looked like royal persons modeled after a deck of playing cards that sold at Skinner's in 1980 or so for about $25,000.00. I have $150.00 bagfaces that I'm happier to have.

Your strategy about affiliating with a dealer is a well traveled one. It has to be a good dealer in whom there is confidence, and one has to be ready to spend fairly steadily or the dealer loses interest. I once had an experience along these lines with a dealer that I found very telling. If you look in Gene's thread about poppies, you will see several Mina Khani rugs I posted there. The dark Baluch with the four petal white flower is something I bought at an auction many years ago. Although it is soft and supple now, when it was offered, it was so dirty that it was stiff like a sheet of birch bark. The pattern was almost illegible. I got it very cheap, as it was ignored by the professional buyers. In those days, I used to bid through the house to remain anonymous, but a few weeks later, I bumped into a young dealer (who is quite prominent in the business now) at another auction. I knew him casually from the circuit, but I had never dealt with him in rugs. He approached me and said that he had heard I had recently bought an old Baluch at such and such an auction (I don't know how he got that information), and was I interested in seeing a nice old piece he had just picked up? Sure, I said. We hiked about a quarter of a mile to his vehicle, and he showed me an absolutely tapped out Baluch that was a piece of junk when it came off the loom. Not interested, I said.

What bothered me was that he had made an assumption about the earlier rug I had bought. Whether he had seen and misjudged it, or operated on hearsay, I can't say. Clearly, he thought I had mistaken a poor example for something nice, so he pretended his poor example was something nice, hoping I'd bite. There's no way he didn't realize his piece was anything but junk. Mine isn't going into a museum in the forseeable future, but it is a very nice Baluch with very saturated somber color, terrific wool, excellent weaving and finish, with a bonus of some very nice sculpted lines due to corrosion. Anyway, I never gave the guy the time of day after that, possibly unfairly, but I took it as a lesson in how to approach dealers. Don't get me wrong, I don't consider dealers an unsavory fraternity, though they are so considered (unfairly, I think) by many. But the example above wasn't the only time a dealer has tried to fake me into believing a rug was better than it was, hoping I would buy. One must approach the field with caution.

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Rich Larkin

Hi Steve,

I find the topic of how rug enthusiasts go about finding what makes them happy to be interesting, as I've indicated. That inevitably raises the question of the financial requirements, which brings us perilously close to commerce. I've mentioned a few prices from past episodes on the assumption that there is a statute of limitations on the issue, but maybe you see it differently. I don't mean to push the limits, or annoy you. Let me know if I am getting too near boundaries that you'd just as soon not have to deal with.

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Rich Larkin

Hi Rich

No problem, especially when the subject is more or less anonymous rugs and the values are those that the market commanded some time in the past. We have real problems when someone says, "Hey, look at the Yomud juval on http://www./?????.com - they've got a $500 asking price and it should sell for ten times that."

Regards

Steve Price

????

Steve,

I hope that ???? site is not a porn site with viruses!!!

Rich, you said:

"Don't get me wrong, I don't consider dealers an unsavory fraternity, though they are so considered (unfairly, I think) by many (collectors)."

Some dealers think:

"Don't get me wrong, I don't consider collectors (and Turkotek, too) an unsavory fraternity, though they are so considered (unfairly, I think) by many (dealers)."

Dealers need to make a living by providing a product and service. Their product is rugs and their service is the expertise they have acquired, which allows them to add a premium to their prices. When I started collecting, it was strictly from dealers. As my "eye" (such as it is) improved, I could buy from other sources such as antique dealers or estate sales and such. And also to "trade up" when I learned more.
But these are some of the same sources that rug dealers use, along with auctions and pickers. When their customers begin to horn in on their sources, the customers bypass the dealers. Not all customers have the time to search around and they are quite delighted to find their treasures at dealer stores. Some experienced collectors who have assembled great collections need the dealers to narrow the field for them. If you only want Kyrghiz main carpets, you could wander the streets endlessly and never find one.
And you never know what a dealer may have that fits your pocketbook and piques your interest. And that may be clothing such as this Salon is all about.
It is a symbiotic relationship where we need them and they need us.
As for beginner collectors, it is like mountain climbing. Nobody starts with Everest. (well, maybe Kircheim) Something has to catch their fancy enough to interest them in collecting. I suspect there are very few oriental rug collectors in most small towns, because they have never seen an antique tribal rug or bag. There has to be a sustainable "critical mass" of items available to them to begin the rug collector meltdown which I and many Turkotek regulars have experienced.

Nuclearly yours,

Patrick Weiler

Hi

A few years back we spent awhile examining the sometimes complicated relationships between dealers and collectors. Since the subject has resurfaced, here is a link to it.

Steve Price

collecting

Rich, et al--

I am lucky to have found a good dealer, and a significant part of my weaving education has been a few purchases, but far more visits looking at his fabulous pieces and learning about them. Mainly because of budget restrictions, but also because it's fun, I have had to engage the adventure of finding the "sleepers" as you describe them. My question in another thread to you about fixing holes is relation to one of those finds. The other issue you refer to in your description of the less-than-wonderful dealer is that your eyes and hands could tell you what was excellent and what wasn't. It is intriguing that there are standards in that regard that a beginner can learn (Ponceau=''), but that a lot of developing a sense of beauty and quality is like that Japanese game of "go", where you just have to play x number of games to be a master. That is where a good dealer can be helpful, if you can borrow their experience. But I have to say that the internet has changed everything, since you can go out there and look at so much stuff at such a vast range of quality without someone standing right there pressuring you to buy. You can flip through the "stacks" of rugs, guilt-free!

Patrick--My town has less than 2000, but fortunately my work takes me to the big city!

Paul

Steve--

Thanks for posting that link on dealers/collectors--very interesting conversations. It reminded me of a New Yorker story several years ago where the writer visited a dealer in Istanbul...just found an abstract (not the whole article, alas) in the New Yorker archives--

http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2000/03/06/2000_03_06_046_TNY_LIBRY_000020337

Paul

Hi Paul,

No doubt about it, if a novice collector can establish a trusting relationship with an experienced and reliable dealer, it is a huge help. As every aficionado knows, it is a field where it is very possible to make big mistakes. When I returned from living in the Middle East, under the mistaken impression that I knew about rugs, I had the benefit of such a relationship with a respected elderly Armenian dealer in the Boston area, Harold Zulalian. He was very kind to me and taught me a lot. He used to say, "Everybody is wanting good rugs, and is bringing me bad rugs." I guess some things will never change in rugs.

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Rich Larkin

I have been looking at your site for some time but only posted on this forum a few days ago for the first time. I guess I should say why I posted in the first place and offer some response to Steve and others comments.

A friend's wife who is a designer (not sure if something is going to automatically zap me for using such a naughty word) found out I had a pile of rugs in my apt. and asked me about them. She thought the subject was very difficult and asked me if I had any suggestions (interestingly enough she has a background in cultural anthropology and art history which perked my ears up a bit more). I told her I only bought rugs I liked and not for any other reason and that I seemed to like tribal or country rugs. I thought about it and gave her some a very mainstream commercial link and book and said she could read and visit a couple stores and would probably be best off finding a dealer or two who could sell to her and guider her as needed.

I have been seriously looking/buying at for less than 15 years in a very off and on fashion which makes me a rather young-turk as a collector/rug fan. Early on, I recognized that I liked the quality and aesthetic of what I will call here quite grossly "Afghan and Belouch" related products. I repeatedly would visit the same shop over and over looking at the piles that interested me, not paying much attention to other areas such as the more formal rugs which maybe were beyond my financial reach at the time--even now, it's pretty hard for me to be interested in a lot of this stuff unless it's museum level stuff. So I guess without knowing it, this conservative approach has shaped my aesthetic perspective, but also given me somewhat of a basis to strike out further on my own. I still feel like a novice because I don't do this professionally and would rather not overstep my desire to have fun with what I am learning about.

My original posting was really to ask, is there some type of "framework" that people with say really high level experience would agree upon which would aid those in trying to understand collecting (or just buying for that matter as prompted by my friend's question). I am prepared to accept that maybe there's not or maybe there is? It seems that ethnography is more important to some or having some idea about physical or design quality may be more important to others. But I would say that nothing is really going to replace looking at thousands of pieces and trying to organize their aesthetic value for one's self.

The good major rug books do provide excellent pathology atlas treatment on most of the major weaving groups and their output. The better scholars I have read certainly admit that attribution is at best imprecise many times and that making sense out of the semiotic nature of weavers patterns can be misleading and futile (I am quite sure some people take issue with this statement, so no offense intended).

Patrick Weiler's comments were very poignant, although I might turn and twist his metaphor a bit and liken the weavers of today to the music performers of today rather than the instrument makers. I have the opportunity to watch a lot of the fine young chamber musicians (who are often lent those wonderful old instrument's Mr. Weiler talks about) and notice that these young musicians are all with very, very few exceptions bent on the very competitive business of building their careers. Pianists play louder and faster to try to get noticed, some will specialize in very modern music if that's where their passion lies. There is some consensus with pianism to be specific that there is less diversity in the up and coming professional players of today as opposed to the giants of yesterday such as Cortot, Richter, Horowitz, Anda et al. (these are pianists from 50 years ago and before that we have recordings of). It is much more difficult to find original sounding pianists today much due to today's musicians careerist needs.

To me rugs and weavers are possibly under the same set of constraints (yes this does sound a bit like a mode of production sermon but I will finish soon). Much more weaving is contracted by wholesalers than it was 50 years ago I suspect (maybe someone who REALLY knows about this could confirm this or say I'm wrong). And of course this ultimately changes the habits and output of the weavers to some degree (obviously there are other factors too).

This change is interesting and it seems to make it all the more important the scholarship and state of knowledge that exists about rugs and in particlar the kind of stuff folks here are interested in.

I don't think I would be qualified to write an introductory essay on novice collecting as Steve Price asked, but I am posing the question whether there is such fundamental information about rug collecting and appreciation can be further canonized or summarized to help the unititated? Or, as I mentioned earlier, is there really no substituion for getting a dealer, spending years buying stuff looking at thousands of pieces etc. My suggestions really could be taking the fun out of all this too!

To a great degree Turkotek serves this purpose and with google you can go to a lot of extremely interesting postings-musings here very quickly. I am just wondering if there is anyone who has acutally thought of principles, or fundamentals of rug appreciation (other than talking about collectors neurosis) that people agree on. Seems like there is a lot of agreement, but it is stored in a lot of different bales.


Cheers, Doug

Hi Doug,

Very thoughtful, to be sure. I can see that you have consulted a few books and have an idea about how the extant body of weavings is distributed around the Middle and Far East as to origin. I have a sense that you have looked at the Eiland books, which I would recommend. Those and other books do provide a serviceable framework within which to flesh out what knowledge one can come by through handling thousands of rugs. I don't know any acceptable substitute for the latter course if you want to have confidence and a good comfort level among the many and motley rugs you will find out there. Everybody who looks at a lot of rugs wherever they can be found knows that there is an enormous variety, not only as to types or origins, but as to condition, treatment rugs may have undergone, and other factors that are important to understand. One must be selective.

I think there is general consensus among experienced handlers of rugs about the general categories, at least for purposes of discussion and practical classification. Thus, one might speak of a Caucasian prayer rug, a Turkish Village rug, a Turkoman storage bag, etc. People generally understand what is being described. There is a certain learning curve to overcme to get to that level. Again, I don't know how it can be done without handling large numbers of rugs. Specifically, I don't see it as feasible relying on images alone, online or in books.

The specific pronouncements about various groups of rugs must be taken with caution. For example, if you look at the work of Richard Wright and John Wertime, you find that many nearly sacred beliefs about Caucasian rugs, for one group, are being convincingly questioned. It is unlikely that an accurate history of weaving even as recently as the 19th Century will ever be created at this point.

Incidentally, commenting on your remark about more and more weaving being contracted by wholesalers as time goes on, I would say you are probably right. However, I think there is much more "quality" weaving being solicited and accomplished these days than was true during most of the 20th Century, at least the latter part of it.

Once one gets past this utilitarian knowledge, I am skeptical that "experts" will be found to share a consensus about the aesthetics of the genre. I think that is all up for grabs. That's where the fun comes in. As I see it, to be safe, you have to learn enough that you at least know what it is you are acquiring. Are the dyes sound? Is the piece compromised? Has it been fooled with (painted, washed with chemicals, etc.)? Not that you can't buy what you want. You just need to know what it really is. After that, as far as aesthetics go, you're the boss, and don't let others intimidate you.

It used to be said often among my friends who "got into" rugs that they never found that they liked the same stuff a few years in. How do you feel about your stack?

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Rich Larkin

Keepers

G'day all,

Rich refered to friends not liking their stuff within a couple of years got me a bit; I love all of mine and look at and touch them fairly constantly. And Ive had most of them half my life.

Its not really hard to remember the few pieces bought and then given away for whatever reason but always loved. Those rugs I loved when I bought them mostly do the same things to me now they did back then.

Do peoples intensity levels of like/dislike, or interest/disinterest fluctuate so frequently? How often does one change their style? I must be getting old... Those things I liked then, I still do today, but Richards last comment made me think.

Regards,
Marty.

Rich,
I like my rugs except for couple mistakes along the way which I have since traded off. I am probably in the minority for amongst turkniks in that I am more interested in new rugs than old--hold on.
Having gone to the Flowers Underfoot exhibit years ago many times and looked at many books, I just see the opportunity to collect really great old rugs really rare in the price range (and periodicity) I hunt in. I hunt around in the piles and see a lot of what my untrained eye sees as "mediocre and overpriced semi-antiques"--it's just never the same level product that you see in musuem plates that somebody wants too much money for. So I would rather try and find very good-to-excellent new pieces that I really like in less frequency than trying to build up a pile of stuff I am not so expert at evaluating. I know one dealer that really looked askance at me when I told him I liked new and recent product.

It seems like a lot of the old stuff in galleries is trade in stuff from the country of it's origin anyway (I have been told). I have also embarked on a project to widen my interests. I do see a lot of very mediocre modern stuff (in non-tribal rugs) so I keep searching to see what makes sense to get. Also, it seems the Belouch product is imported as "from Iran" in some dealerships whereas at least some of this looks like it suspiciously cam from Peshawar, Afghanistan etc--no way I know this, just a feeling. Probably the reason for my predilection for newer stuff is the way I have been "raised" by various dealers, but I am quite interested in looking at and finding good stuff being produced today.

One other note, I was looking at some old Turkotek postings and came across the "Pinner Principle". I found this to be quite humorous and worthy of mention to those who haven't been looking at Turkotek forever--
http://www.turkotek.com/salon_00103/s103t8.htm
I found Mr. Howe's comments (from several years ago now) quite informative to me I hope this is within the rules to link to.
Cheers, Doug

Hi Doug,

Interesting. What kinds of new rugs have you acquired that you are happy to have gotten?

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Rich Larkin

Most of my rugs are beluch or afghan--a favorite being a very classic waziri rug with a pretty fine weave. I am trying to get some more Iranian rugs, but am not pleased with a lot of the popluar ones from the past (non-tribal variety that are mid-priced). Recently I paid too much for a very nice Southern Iranian piece which I like a whole lot which makes me much more interested in this region. In general I am specifically interested in "decent" stuff being currently produced--doesn't mean I am not interested in old rugs, but the really good antiques (that I would probably like to take home) are probably beyond my reach to acquire so I concentrate on what I like in the current piles and can swing. Also there is something that attracts me about trying to find the really great rugs being made now. Hope that answers your question. Doug

Doug,

When I was an avid collector, there were three paramount considerations: color, color and color. Synthetic colors (as I discerned them) were death. Looking back on it (and after taking in the views of many TurkoTekkers this time around), I think I was insufficiently concerned about design. What moves you the most?

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Rich Larkin

Uniqueness and attractiveness of design as it pertains to the whole piece is the only thing I have ever thought about when evauating whether I liked a rug or not. I'm sure color is part of that, but above all else whether I thought the design was attractive or not (the degree of compostional refinement and restrained execution present) and not at all about anything else.

I do find a tendency for the really great, older carpets to have much richer compositional detail as most would agree, but...the best ones are in the rug books I look at rather than the bales I might paw through There's a lot of very interesting scholarly things written about insect and vegetable derrived dyes, but I can't say that at my level it I think about it that much--also color mismatch in modern rugs might be something I would find on the things I haven't had that much experience with such as the more traditional city rugs coming from Iran nowadays. I wonder if anyone has ever used the term suburban rug before? Hope that answers your question and hasn't bored anyone who is still reading this thread who knows about this stuff. Cheers, Doug

>a qausi crisis in finding the next generation of collectors for tribal textiles.

If you were 20 in 1960, you could find pre-war rugs second hand. The rugs were 30 or 40 years old then, veg dyed, and needing a wash but not restoration. Today, you're pushing 70, and the used rugs you bought 40 or 50 years ago are now practically impossible to find undervalued in nonspecialist markets. Most of what you do find secondhand is overpriced, beyond repair, or both. Estate sales, for example, are now mostly run by semi-pros who are unlikely to let anything good slip past.

If you're 20 today, the 30 to 40 year-old rugs you might plausibly find cheaply as ordinary used goods are the same rugs your dad avoided new--and they're no better now, but now they need a wash, overcasting, etc. Economical and aesthetically, there's no percentage in it. The lack of young collectors is an echo of the bad post-war village rugs. A lost generation of rugs yields a lost next generation of collectors.

Some of the recent revival productions are an exception. Eventually, they'll go stray into the secondhand market, where people will buy them at bargain prices as honest used rugs--and maybe the collector cycle beings again, skipping a generation.

Ebay is another exception. On-line, you can tap into the international wholesale markets and buy pre-war pieces right off the floor. Some stuff auctioned "raw" looks like culls from the antique trade due to origin, condition, or fashion. The ability to cherry pick them isn't something readily learned from books. Lacking access to used rugs through local secondary sources, the new collector can't readily develop the black-art, fingertip knowledge needed to buy from JPEGs. Does ebay drawing new collectors towards the subject? Or is it just too difficult to acquire the addiction if you have to buy rugs without seeing, feeling, and touching them first?

--Steve Pendleton

Pure wisdom, Steve.

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Rich Larkin

collecting and eBay

Steve--

I am an example of someone drawn deeper into collecting through eBay. I can only rarely purchase pieces from dealers, but I have had a lot of fun scanning the corners and shadows of eBay and found that careful examination of jpegs can lead to real treasures. Someone mentioned in this thread about the difficulty of being in a small town and getting into this world, but eBay is one way that I have done this in the wilds of Eastern Washington.

Paul

Hi Folks,

I admire your courage in putting out real money based on digital images on a monitor. When I was in hibernation mode in this hobby over a number of years, my one nod to it was to check out the Skinner catalog online once or twice a year, then visit the preview with my girlfriend. (That was our idea of a hot time on the town.) I noted how often the rug in the wool turned out to be different than what I had anticipated. Sometimes better, sometimes worse. And I was coming into it with the experience of having handled thousands of rugs over the years. Granted, the rugs offered in the online auction venues usually give a better set of pictures and close-ups, but that only improves the odds. It doesn't eliminate the problem. (I have come to realize that the words of death are, "Please note pictures carefully. All sales are final.")

I would be interested to know generically how often the online buyers feel they got burned.

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Rich Larkin

getting burned

Richard--

Once, I bought a fine small Qashqa'i rug on eBay that has silk wefts in which the color had bled on the back. The seller had not shown this in the images, and so what was a ridiculous price turned out to be a reasonable price, but I felt that I was "burned" because the seller had concealed something. This is the exception, and more than made up for by a string of delightful purchases of things I would never otherwise see. The most remarkable in this category was a sweet little fragment of a 16th-c. "Lotto" carpet (this has been authenticated by an expert, incidentally) for $40. The weird thing about that was that it was posted as "Lotto carpet fragment", but I think people didn't believe the seller.

I envy your being able to go to Skinners just for a fun evening. There IS a reason to be in the big city. I would hesitate to buy from their online catalog alone though because the images are not very good, and the prices are substantial enough that I would want to be there to handle the items.

Paul

Hi Paul,

Migawd!! A Lotto fragment for $40.00? I don't believe it. The only problem with that is, you have to retire. There's nowhere to go but down.

Can we see it?

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Rich Larkin

Hi Rich

I've bought a few rugs (and lots of other things!) on eBay, although I don't put serious money into anything unless I know the vendor. I don't think I've ever been badly burned on a rug, but have run into some deadbeat sellers. Overall, I'm waaaay ahead, money wise despite the occasional bad deal.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi all,

I've found some success on EBay as well, and communication is a crucial component of that success. Utilizing the ability to ask questions of the vendors, particularly requests for additional images (close-ups, etc), has played an important part of my decision making process.

Also, asking the right questions goes a long way toward satisfaction: Does it smell of mildew, is there any documentation on provenance, are the fibers flexible or brittle, etc. ?

Regards,
Chuck Wagner

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Chuck Wagner

I got your lotto...

Paul,

I thought everyone from the Palouse would be on the Interstate today, crossing the Cascade mountains for that annual internecine football parody playing out in Seattle between the Pullman team and the Seattle team. But rugs are more important!

I bought a Qashqai chanteh for about that same price ($40) several years ago on e-bay. It was listed as a "Carpet Piece" and had been used as a doily. And no bleeding reds, either. If it had been listed as Qashqai chanteh, 19th century, perhaps I would not have been so fortunate. The only Lotto I can find around here is the State Lotto.
As Richard says, there is no substitute for grubbing through piles of overpriced, beat-up, smelly, flea and moth ridden rags for the occasional pearl. Then you have a better chance of not getting stung on-line because you have "paid your dues" learning about pieces and prices "in the field".
But it still happens. If your modus operandi is anything like mine - haunting antique stores, flea-markets, yard sales and thrift shops for a cheap piece of tribal weaving - then you are more likely on-line to fall for a low-priced bag face that is even younger than you are.
E-bay especially can be a pig-in-a-poke because of the colors, the fading and the bleeding. I have a stack of rejects in the corner that would be the envy of a '70s hippy with black lights, beads and incense. Most of them looked fine on line, but just don't pass muster in the harsh glare of the sober light of day when UPS drops the box off and they finally reach the kitchen table - nothing left to do but the autopsy...

Nowadays I try to restrain my urge to hit the Confirm Bid button more so than a few years back when it seemed like the best stuff on e-bay would be gone in a few months and soon there would be nothing left but the chaff. Come to think of it, maybe that is the case by now. Some folks think the time spent trudging through the wasteland on e-bay is time wasted. But it sure saves on gas money!

Patrick Weiler

Hi Folks,

You guys are intrepid. I have a ton of war stories about buying out of wherever, but they are so long ago, they are obsolete. (See Steve Pendleton's comments, above.) Even so, there is no substitute for going through the endless drek that is there to be inspected. The problem with that method, I used to find, was that one became so inured to junk of every description that when the odd Enjelus mat showed up with decent wool and color (maybe a knockoff Seraband design of boteh, so many amoeba taking naps in rows on the surface), one thought one had found the Ardebil carpet. It's also imprtant to handle good rugs regularly, to keep in mind what we are trying to accomplish.

Chuck's comment about asking the questions is a good one. I have noted that many of the sellers make a point about "no odors." Funny, I never thought much about odors in looking for rugs. Anything invoking notions of sheep, goats or camels was OK. Mildew is bad.

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Rich Larkin

Calling all cyberspace collectors

Hi all,

I have a question about shopping for rugs on Ebay. I used to have a bookmark at that site for rugs, pre-1900. As I recall, it was simple to set that up, and when I would link onto it, there would typically be 150-200 pieces shown. That computer went away, and I wasn't onto that link for awhile. Recently, I have tried to recreate the bookmark, but whatever I do, I end up with a link that shows typically, 10-12 pieces (8-10 of which I don't want to look at). I realize that there are many variables involved, but any suggestions as to what I'm doing wrong? (Hint: I seem to be linking onto only "buy it now" items, but I'm not being successful changing that.)

(I don't plan to buy, I just want to monitor what you guys are buying.)

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Rich Larkin

Everyone--



It's a little fragment, this Lotto (8"x12"), but was still a delight at that price! My lovely wife is currently making a cross-stitched version of it; since we have just enough to figure out the field pattern we can extend it with a little imagination (and a bunch of images--there's one in Gantzhorn's book that fills in some of the missing parts). The light blue parts of the lattice are interesting...I have only seen "Lotto" carpets in publication, but I haven't seen one that has some of the lattice in light blue, as this one does. We'll end up with a yastik-size mini-Lotto.

I tend not to ask too many questions of eBay sellers, since my specialty is finding those things that are completely misidentified and I don't want to draw too much attention to my discovery. With these I limit myself to a small enough budget that I'm OK if it were to be a disaster. I keep thinking that the golden age of eBay is over, but there is a steady stream of interesting things there.

Richard...I have a complicated search involving terms and excluding particular words (like "semi") and the annoying sellers who call something made in 2002 antique. Some of the best things I have found were not labeled "pre-1900". I have to adjust my search information every few months as new volume sellers arrive who conceive new ways to list junky rugs. I end up with about 300 entries, of which maybe 20-50 are worth looking at.

Paul

Bravo, Paul. Nice item. Thanks for posting it. I'd love to see the repro when it is done, too.

__________________
Rich Larkin

It's natural that those ALREADY collecting in the late 1990s would adapt to Ebay. And it's natural that those ALREADY knowing wool and dye would find bargains and cheats there. I've got my own trophies and follies. In raw co$t, I'm ahead (even after writing off a third) (but also writing off the days spent washing and weaving).

The question is whether the online-only approach can foster a new generation of collectors. I'm skeptical. Buying local used rugs has risks, but you can delimit them. Buying intercontinental used rugs is MUCH more abstract. If you're already immersed in the subject, willing to wash out 60 years of tobacco, and your wife is willing to take an actuarial view of losses, then Ebay can teach you things that books can't and dealers won't.

Novice collectors are in a different spot. They face an elevated risk of being burned and therefore an elevated risk of quitting before they can mitigate the risks. As a learning curve gets steeper, fewer climb it, and at some slope there's individuals but no community. Ebay was invented to serve one thinly distributed collector population (Pez dispensors) but might accelerate the thinning of another (antique rugs). You can sustain a trade of manufactured items at a distance (Pez) but maybe not unique items (rugs).

One solution is the local dealer. Ebay undercuts them by taking away part of the collector market. In time, there are fewer dealers, and the novice has fewer options.

There's optimism too. Raw old rugs off ebay are maybe 1/4 the price of clean rugs at retail. A lower stake means more gamblers, and some eventually become experts. And Ebay shows a far wider range of examples than the coffee-table books do, encouraging a faster transition from cookbook collecting.

--Steve Pendleton

Hi all,

I still consider myself to be very much a novice in this rug-buying enterprise. We have only a few more rugs than we can use in our home, so I suppose we can't fit the bill as hard-core "collectors".

We have bought a few pieces online, and only one has been a real disappointment (a Jaff Kurd without great colours...). Happily, the price wasn't high. The other online purchases have turned out to be delights. I agree with the viewpoint that if you have seen and handled a lot of rugs, there is a reasonable chance that you can get a sense of what to look for in an online purchase. Still, I tend to be very wary.

Still, nothing replaces the fun and interest of buying "in person", which in my case has carried the added attraction of doing so in Asia. I've never bought a rug in N. America, though I have looked through a number of specialty dealers' shops and even at some estate sales. My experience has been that although there are some good pieces available, the prices are way beyond what I am prepared to pay.

James.

Hi James,

So I take it you think you can buy more advantageously "in country" than in North America? When you mention estate sales in N. A., do you mean auction sales or staged sales, i. e., glorified yard sales?

__________________
Rich Larkin

Buying on ebay

Rich, almost all of my buying has been on ebay.

Getting to understand photos, and sellers, is something of a skill. I also have a rug friend/experienced dealer who is willing to answer questions about items that I see. He's been a huge help.

Whether you're buying from ebay or from a "reputable" auction house the problem of odds is the same. If you cannot attend the preview (yay! the Skinners/Grogans previews are an hour away now that I've moved :-), then I'd say your odds on ebay are substantially better.

Pros of auction houses:
1. Have a preview where locals can handle the rug
2. Have professionals describing the rugs, not amateurs (!)
3. Less junk to sort through
4. Better prices for trendy rugs (e.g. Bijars, Kazaks). Ebay definitely reflects the popular will since many people are on line. So trendy types tend to be more expensive.

Pros of ebay:
1. Better photos. I am appaled that big auction houses don't provide half a dozen photos online, including a decent one of the back. On ebay, you can look at several photos for about a week before making a decision.
2. More responsive sellers. I kid you not. I'm still new at this, and have only sent 4 requests for information to (major) auction houses. One took two requests to reply, one was answered on the first request, and two were ignored. These requests weren't arcane, basically requesting a condition report and a photo of the back. For ebay, there is usually a fast turn around and considerable helpfulness.
3. A better return policy. Some ebay sellers take returns no questions asked, some accept returns in case of mistaken description, a few state "all sales final." Some sellers give partial refunds for fixable problems.
4. Better prices for dinged rugs and bag faces.
5. No buyer's premium, small seller's premium.
6. Easier payment. Most sellers take paypal, and it's a few clicks.

The above items are obviously not weighted equally, so a simplistic "ebay wins 6 to 4" is not the conclusion I would draw. But for certain, not junky, acquisitions, I think ebay is the way to go.

Have I been burned on ebay? Slightly, but not as bad as some folks I know from reputable auction houses: "Oh, we forgot to mention the glued back? Sorry about that, and sucks to be you." "We didn't mention the $50 per item processing fee for shipping? No no no, shipping costs are extra on top of that." My worst ebay burns:

1. Winning a mule stomped old Kazak for a smallish sum and being sent the wrong rug. Strung along by seller until the *60* day period for paypal refunds expired. You have 90 days on ebay to file a complaint, but only 60 days to get money back. On the plus side, instead she sent me a holey (not in the religious sense) antique Shirvan that was quite restorable.



2. A rug that had the ends overcast. Seller did not reply to complaint. On the other hand, price was excellent (as was the rug). His feedback will get dinged. There is no way a non-blind person would miss the long ends being overcast with black wool.

3. Being sold a clean 1920s Bijar sampler with wool foundation that was none of those things. Had to pay shipping both ways on that one to get a refund. Ditto for a 1930s Bijar mat.

That's it. Those have been my worst experiences.


Like other posters, I feel I've come out way ahead. The best pickup was a Baluch double bag face for the princely sum of $12 (with shipping). Correction: an incredibly beautiful, ancient, looks like it's on fire in bright light bag face for $12.





It's battered and bruised and has some granny repairs, but I still find it beautiful.

The time spent looking at rugs on ebay can be thought of as being wasted, or part of the rug education. Looking at a rug is a poor substitute for handling it, but it is a partial substitute. You can develop a sense of how to grade items of a certain type, learn about the range of weavings available, etc. People who have been at collecting for a decade probably don't find such explorations useful, but for novices like myself, time on ebay is informative. I mean, where else would I have learned about the Gabbeh, a subtribe of the Qashqai who live in southeast Iran?

joe

Re: Calling all cyberspace collectors

quote:

---

Originally posted by Richard Larkin
I have a question about shopping for rugs on Ebay. I used to have a bookmark at that site for rugs, pre-1900.
...
(I don't plan to buy, I just want to monitor what you guys are buying.)

---

Hi Joe,

Excellent posts, and I appreciate your insights and experiences. I hope to respond more fully soon when I have the time.

__________________
Rich Larkin

Joe,

I greatly enjoyed the detailed description of your ebay approach. Looking back, I realize a good deal of my enjoyment of the hobby was the hunting of rugs with modest financial resources, and I am interested in hearing how people approach that challenge today. Here's my reservaton about buying without having the merchandise in hand.

Having handled very many rugs in a context of judging them for sale purposes, I feel reasonably confident in assessing pictures up to a point, especially the typical multiple array with close detail shots, front and back. One can imagine the similar rug one has had in hand many times, and assess probable condition problems. Similarly, I can generally spot colors, including the usual suspects among bad quality synthetic colors. Where I get cold feet is in making the final judgment about the rug that is a cut above its cousins in quality and vibrancy of color. For example, many popular Caucasian rugs fall into the "seen one, seen 'em all" category. But now and then, one finds the one that is a standout. I find it hard to discern that quality in pictures if the extra element is color and wool. Your little $12.00 Baluch is a good example. I know just what you are talking about with the color aflame, and I believe it. But it is hard to see that situation on the screen. Not that it doesn't look good, it does, but one cannot see that it is so much more special than a more pedestrian example without having it in hand. Agree? How do you deal with this challenge?

__________________
Rich Larkin

I buy on Ebay, think I'm well ahead, and rarely visit dealers because it's unfair to use their inventory to improve my Ebay skills. The question of whether I'm ahead buying online is complex. It's easy to focus on the money. In dollars, I'm way ahead. There's more to life than money, though. I'm undertaking risks that would be absent buying locally. I've donated rugs that were no good even for pillows, so risk is cost even if you win. I've also spent significant time in hobby tasks. I could instead sell the time and use the cash to buy safe, clean rugs at retail.

To muddy the waters, here's an example:

1. I bought a dozar on Ebay. It's the kind of thing bought as Hamadan and sold as Kurd. I paid ~$250 and incurred risks of non-delivery, misrepresentation, etc.

2. On receipt, it didn't smell bad, and it wasn't gummy, but I washed it anyway. Costs include a half-day of hard work, $5.00 in Orvus, and the risk of destroying the piece. The result is glowing wool and glowing color. Amazing pumpkin-skin orange and double-dyed green. Kudos to the Kurds.

3. As disclosed, most of the protection wool was gone. Costs are $5.00 in wool and at least a day rewrapping the selvedges. It's relaxing, it's a productive use of time, and my wife thinks it's cute.

4. As disclosed, the piece had two quarter-sized moth holes. Costs are $5.00 in wool, more than a day in time, and the risk of finding the job beyond my skills. Matching color and structure yields a convincing repair, but I didn't know the future when I clicked "confirm."

After washing and restoration, the piece might sell for $1500 at retail. I've saved $1000, learned some things, paid respect to the memory of the woman who wove it, and put it in condition for another 50 years of use. On the other hand, I've spent $300 in cash, an unknown sum in risk, and more than three days in time. Am I ahead? There's no easy answer. I'll do it again, but it's inaccurate to call it a $250 rug. My perception that I'm ahead is the result of enjoying it and not necessarily a gain that a normal person would endorse.

--Steve Pendleton

Steve, Rich, Joseph--

I envy your having skills to repair your pieces. I can wash them, but I can't repile. Thus, my $10 wonderful little eBay Baluch rug of last month with three small holes (but otherwise mint condition) had to go to a repair person, but it will still be a great deal. I think, in response to Rich's inquiry about whether you can make a really accurate judgment about something being wonderful via online images, is that sometimes you can, but often you cannot. So, you have to get the thing so cheap that it is worth the risk. Joseph's $12 investment is a perfect example. It actually does look to me like a fine example, but if it wasn't--well, who cares at that price!! I don't buy "expensive" (for me, over, say, $300) items unless I really know what I am looking at or it is from one of the few trustworthy dealers (there are some) on eBay.

Don't you wish there was some way to go after some of these people who keep listing absolute crap on eBay and calling it "antique" or seriously misrepresenting the age?

Paul

PS. Is there a book that is generally available that can show someone how to do decent repairs?

Hi Paul

Peter Stone, Oriental Rug Repair. I don't have this book and haven't read it, but Stone writes well and usually knows what he's talking about. If I were going to take up repair work, I'd start with this book.

Steve Price

repair

Thanks for the suggestion of the Stone book--I am inspired! I ordered it, and am bringing back my eBay ten buck Baluchi to see what I can do myself. It is time for me to get serious enough to get some yarn in my hand!

Paul

Rich, I agree that it's difficult or impossible to distinguish the cream of the crop on the basis of photos. I have a few coping strategies:

1. Don't try to find the absolute best via photos. I'm still beginning, so would probably be happy with a prayer rug in the top 2% or so of what exists on ebay (*very* different than the top 2% at your local dealer). I think I can order items well enough to pick up such items, or at least well such that if I like an item in the photos, it probably is a top 2% example (and thus accepting there will be some winners that I can't detect). I believe this process gets harder as your collection gets better. You certainly acquire more experience, and thus get better at sorting items. However, you want better and better things. I think the second process tends to dominate. So as you get more experienced, dealers and auctions that you can attend the preview for tend to become more common sources of material.

2. Pick pieces such that it almost doesn't matter what the wool or exact color shade are like. For example, I was (and still am :-) trying to find a Kazak with bold designs. During my search I came across the following on ebay:



Certainly not a piece to acquire if you're condition conscious, but otherwise--grab it. In the interest of full disclosure, this piece appeared when I knew even less than I do now, and I simply didn't believe the seller's description (I mean, the seller didn't even realize it was a beautiful Kazak and insisted on calling it a Turkish rug ) and so I didn't bid on it. Mercifully no one else did either, and I managed to get the Bergama.

3. Use information about the seller. For some sellers, every piece is amazing, best of type, etc. Others are more sparing in their praise. I take the (mentally adjusted) seller comments into consideration. Some signs I use for good sellers:

i. Acknowledge synthetic dyes in the piece, and will admit to dyes about which they are suspicious.
ii. Claim (some) items were woven in the 20th century. My confidence in a seller goes way up when he lists an attractive piece as circa 1920.
iii. Points on flaws in the item, and provides good photos of them.
iv. Calls a Hamadan a Hamadan rather than a "(Kurd) tribal rug"
v. Explains when images are overselling the rug. For example, one seller had a rug with an inscribed date of 1835, which he pointed out was not plausible as one of the reds looked synthetic to him.

Asking the seller questions can also be helpful. For example, in one recent ebay offering I wrote asking for an assessment of the quality of the item and got a response of "a good example, but not a great one." Again, you have to partial the response relative to the seller's believability.

4. Minor tactics (for online newbies):
i. Keep item size in mind. A large rug shown as a small picture will appear to have nice crisp designs. When seen in real size it looks very different and much blurrier. I try to think about what is the zoom in the photos relative to real life, and how far away I'd have to be to see the item like that.

ii. Download the photos into image editing software. Auto correct is very useful, as a lot of photos have a color tinge to them. Another useful feature is to look at the color histogram. You shouldn't expect a normal distribution, but can spot tell tale-mucking with the colors to make them appear incredibly good. Both features are available in Picasa (free download), and I suspect most photo editing software.

5. Find a guru. I found someone who doesn't mind occasional pestering about ebay items and who knows a ton--he's been a dealer for about 40 years and evaluates a lot of rugs from photos. It's humbling to send him a listing with photos of frustrating quality and get back a reply of "great wools, buy it!" Some day I need to sit down with him and find out what he uses to decide (if he even knows consciously).

joe

Re: repair

quote:

---

Originally posted by Paul Smith
Thanks for the suggestion of the Stone book--I am inspired! I ordered it, and am bringing back my eBay ten buck Baluchi to see what I can do myself. It is time for me to get serious enough to get some yarn in my hand!

Paul

---

>fixing holes

Trying to stay on the topic of "collecting" and not drift into technique, I don't see how you can collect rugs and avoid needle skills. You cross the threshold from buying to collecting when you have your own purpose and expertise. At that point, you become less dependent on dealer taste, start seeking secondary sources, and immediatly run into the full range of condition issues. To evaluate "as-is" goods--even if you plan to pay someone to do the work--you have to know which ones are practical candidates. There's no substitute for needle skills when trying to figure out what something is worth. Some things that look a bit ratty are easy to fix up (or rule out).

Every collector should at a minimum know enough to make sure the ends and edges are always secure. You owe that much to the woman who wove the piece.

--Steve Pendleton

Hi Steve and Joe

First, to Steve: Me, and lots of other collectors, rarely undertake even the simplest of repairs. It doesn't seem to me to be a requirement for being classified as a collector any more than restoration skills are necessary to be a collector of paintings. Most of my textiles hang on walls, and we hardly ever have antique pieces on the floors. So durability is rarely an issue.

Second, to Joe: I think your estimate that 2% of what's on eBay is of potential collector interest is too high by at least tenfold. Right now, eBay's "Antiques/Rugs, Carpets" category lists nearly 15,000 items. My best guess is that not more than 10 or 15 of them would get a second look from most collectors.

Regards

Steve Price

repairing

Steve, Steve, and Joe--

I am attracted to the craft of repair but I do think that it is ancillary to collecting rugs. I started with this sort of thing as a starving musician, where I fixed and rebuilt my instruments partially because I couldn't afford for anyone else to do it, but also because I enjoyed it. It seems to me that it is a creative endeavor and you would have to be into that sort of thing, but it appeals to me. It also helps that my wife is skilled in sewing and stitching and will give me pointers (she has already demonstrated talent in securing ends and selvedges).

I also agree that the percentage of interesting things on eBay is close to .1%. There appear to be two levels--the nice pieces properly identified by the seller, and the gems...the "old rug, maybe Southwest" that turns out to be a lovely antique Baluchi kilim. You gotta love that stuff!

Paul

Hi Folks,

Speaking as an old hunter of rugs on the fringe, and an attender of auctions back in the day, I always believed that every now and then, a wave of mass hypnosis would sweep through the assembled wholesale buyers in the back of the room. Something worth having would come up, and they all would stare at it as it went by. In that way, the humble among the crowd could get a rug now and then. Back then, they were working a syndicate, too, to buy cheap and auction off the goods among themselves. It was called "the ring." I understand the Feds put a stop to it.

Anyway, I wonder whether the phenomenon occurs in Internet auctions. Maybe Paul has it covered. You have to find items flying under the radar by reason of misdescriptions. Transylvanian prayer rugs labeled as Spartas, that sort of thing.

__________________
Rich Larkin

How much stuff on ebay is any good

Steve, my 2% estimate had a big caveat that I neglected to mention: it has to show up on my searches. I have a decent set of filters and tend to forget that the rest of ebay even exists. For example, here's what I see:

1. Anything listed as pre 1900.

2. Anything pre 1940 that hits a longish list of keywords.

3. Unless you're a list of 15 sellers or so. In that case your stuff will not show up no matter how it is described. These are sellers who list everything as pre 1900, and who systematically misrepresent junk. For reasons of turkotek policy, I won't quote the list. The advanced search tab lets you ban up to 10 sellers from your search, and clever use of keywords can take care of additional ones.

After those filters, I would guess that I would like ~2% of (Baluch) prayer rugs listed. Note that I did not claim anything about appealing generic collectors, simply that I would find it appealing.

joe

Hi Joe

With that clarification, I think your estimate is right. If we only consider a filtered subset of Belouch prayer rugs, about 2% are likely to be interesting.

Regards

Steve Price

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joseph Beck
Rich, I agree that it's difficult or impossible to distinguish the cream of the crop on the basis of photos. I have a few coping strategies:

1. Don't try to find the absolute best via photos. I'm still beginning, so would probably be happy with a prayer rug in the top 2% or so of what exists on ebay (*very* different than the top 2% at your local dealer). I think I can order items well enough to pick up such items, or at least well such that if I like an item in the photos, it probably is a top 2% example (and thus accepting there will be some winners that I can't detect). I believe this process gets harder as your collection gets better. You certainly acquire more experience, and thus get better at sorting items. However, you want better and better things. I think the second process tends to dominate. So as you get more experienced, dealers and auctions that you can attend the preview for tend to become more common sources of material.

2. Pick pieces such that it almost doesn't matter what the wool or exact color shade are like. For example, I was (and still am :-) trying to find a Kazak with bold designs. During my search I came across the following on ebay:



Certainly not a piece to acquire if you're condition conscious, but otherwise--grab it. In the interest of full disclosure, this piece appeared when I knew even less than I do now, and I simply didn't believe the seller's description (I mean, the seller didn't even realize it was a beautiful Kazak and insisted on calling it a Turkish rug ) and so I didn't bid on it. Mercifully no one else did either, and I managed to get the Bergama.

3. Use information about the seller. For some sellers, every piece is amazing, best of type, etc. Others are more sparing in their praise. I take the (mentally adjusted) seller comments into consideration. Some signs I use for good sellers:

i. Acknowledge synthetic dyes in the piece, and will admit to dyes about which they are suspicious.
ii. Claim (some) items were woven in the 20th century. My confidence in a seller goes way up when he lists an attractive piece as circa 1920.
iii. Points on flaws in the item, and provides good photos of them.
iv. Calls a Hamadan a Hamadan rather than a "(Kurd) tribal rug"
v. Explains when images are overselling the rug. For example, one seller had a rug with an inscribed date of 1835, which he pointed out was not plausible as one of the reds looked synthetic to him.

Asking the seller questions can also be helpful. For example, in one recent ebay offering I wrote asking for an assessment of the quality of the item and got a response of "a good example, but not a great one." Again, you have to partial the response relative to the seller's believability.

4. Minor tactics (for online newbies):
i. Keep item size in mind. A large rug shown as a small picture will appear to have nice crisp designs. When seen in real size it looks very different and much blurrier. I try to think about what is the zoom in the photos relative to real life, and how far away I'd have to be to see the item like that.

ii. Download the photos into image editing software. Auto correct is very useful, as a lot of photos have a color tinge to them. Another useful feature is to look at the color histogram. You shouldn't expect a normal distribution, but can spot tell tale-mucking with the colors to make them appear incredibly good. Both features are available in Picasa (free download), and I suspect most photo editing software.

5. Find a guru. I found someone who doesn't mind occasional pestering about ebay items and who knows a ton--he's been a dealer for about 40 years and evaluates a lot of rugs from photos. It's humbling to send him a listing with photos of frustrating quality and get back a reply of "great wools, buy it!" Some day I need to sit down with him and find out what he uses to decide (if he even knows consciously).

joe

---

Taj, the rug is actually a rather old Bergama (Western Turkey) rather than a Kazak. It shocked me to find out it was Turkish, as it screams "Kazak!" to my eye too. But apparently a fair number of Bergama rugs are geometric looking.

It's about 60" x 71". There is a tiny bit of the flatweave edge at the bottom of the rug, so it's possible to tell that it's missing between 1" and 2" all around. So it was probably more like 63" x 74" originally. I'm not sure if the amount of border loss technically makes it a huge fragment.

The weave is about 6h x 8v, with some places slightly (about half a knot in either direction) finer. There is no warp depression. The warps are white wool. The wefts are red wool, with anywhere from 2 to 4 wefts.

So even this rug's structure is very Kazak-like. Apparently there has been speculation about the the connections between Bergamas and Kazaks, but little hard evidence.

joe

Hello Joe,

Thank you for this new information. I will definitely take a look into the comparisons of both! I would also love to find a beautiful Kazak with bold colors and designs. But, with this new insight, I can look at both.

Regards,
Taj Nadar

Kazak alternatives

Taj, I've run into the problem of trying to get a nice Kazak for a price that I could afford, and have come up with a few options.

Here is another picture of the Bergama (after some minor restorations)



The colors look better in this picture than the original, but somewhat less Kazak-like. Still, from a design standpoint, it's a reasonable option. Sigh...the photo came with poor lighting, a flash, and the autocorrect button on my software. I think that's what it would look like with decent light. Definitely a motivation to get better lighting installed.


Another option to consider is mafrash panels. For some reason they go for less than soumak bag faces, probably because there are a lot more of mafrash panels around (true?). Ebay tends to be littered with them, some of them are even nice.

Here is a caucasian complete mafrash with nice borders that make good use of negative space:



I like the heavy use of green.


A caucasian mafrash end panel


The latch hook designs are fairly common in mafrash, but are usually a bit more precisely drawn. If you like Bordjalou Kazaks, these can serve as a very nice substitute.

Another benefit of mafrash is they often use cotton for whites. That provides an extra dose of contrast, a feature common in Kazaks (but pile production typically does not use cotton). My experience has also been that mafrash seem to be more likely to be composed of natural dyes (more accurately, dyes that look natural to me, and don't run when washed with Orvus). I don't know if I wound up with older pieces, or if mafrash stayed "good" longer--or if my eye needs work.

joe

Hi Joe, et al,

That Bergama does have Kazak overtones, more in the field than the border, although it is a pretty typical Bergama. I think you mentioned earlier in this thread that there was some published material speculating about a connection between the two groups. Can you say more about it?

Your point about the apparent persistence of "good" dyes in flatwoven utility pieces in the greater Caucasus and environs is an apt one that I've also wondered about. There seems to be a relatively plentiful supply of pieces that seem "right," and it seems unlikely they are all "late nineteenth century," as the prevalent wisdom would have it. Your surmise that the colors are good is probably correct, in my opinion. Without having searched, I wonder whether the Richard Wright or John Wertime sources deal with the question.

Regards for the new year.

Hi People

Flatwoven mafrash panels are probably the most underpriced of all collectible western Asian textiles. Mafrash end panels are about the same size as khorjin faces, but the prices will differ by 3 to 10 fold for more or less comparable pieces. I don't know why this is so.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi Steve,

Interesting. I don't really follow the market these days, and I hadn't noticed the phenomenon. I know we can't get into the details too much on TurkoTek. It sounds like a good hunting area for new collectors.

Hi Rich

We can't talk about market values of specific pieces or say anything about specific vendors, but anybody can make his personal survey of things for sale in venues that are open to him. EBay, various on-line sellers. A simple observation is that there are typically several flatwoven khorjin faces in every mayor auction catalog, hardly ever any flatwoven mafrash panels. They're just not valuable enough to include.

Regards

Steve Price

Hi Steve,

As I said, I don't recall absorbing the point. Clearly a place for an interested hobbyist and afficionado with limited means to make progress. I'm mostly a pile guy, chiefly by default, but I would happily acquire some of the better looking mafrash panels. Weaving is weaving.

Hi Steve,
I like good mafrash end panels, too, but think of them more as yardage goods whereas good khojin faces are showcased compositions, and complete works of art.
I would't compare their respective values on a price per square inch basis and I guess collectors don't either. Sue

Hi Joe,

I just took another look at your Bergamo and noticed the lower right side of the main border is a variant pattern. Is this a patch from another rug, or a weaver's whim in the manner of the Baluch and the Kurds? If it's the latter, I would say I don't expect that sort of thing so much in Anatolian village weaving or workshop weaving.

Hi Sue

Most collectors won't pay serious money for mafrash end panels, so you stand with the majority in that respect. But yardage goods? Surely, you're joking.

Steve Price

Bergama border

Rich, you're right about the border on the bottom right changing (well, it's really the top left, as the rug is upside down relative to how it was woven). It's not a patch. I don't know if it's evidence of a captive Baluch, Kurd, or Ersari weaver :-) There is a moderate amount of playfulness in the weaving, with the top and bottom halves having some large changes in design, and a lesser but non-trivial amount in the horizontal direction.


For the Bergama-Kazak connection, exactly what constitutes a Bergama is somewhat iffy (woven only within Bergama itself, or does the label include nearby towns?). One area near Bergama is called Kozak. Apparently those rugs look similar to Caucasian rugs, and the Bergama I have is supposedly of that type--or at least that's what the seller called it. Eiland and Eiland (Oriental Carpets A Complete Guide, p178) mention that there has been a lot of speculation about the similarities between Kozak and Kazak, but no hard evidence. They don't provide references though. It does seem weird that there is one letter difference, red wefts, and a similar knotting density from 2 areas so geographically distant.


joe

Mafrash panels vs. bag faces

I agree with Steve that mafrash are underpriced relative to their aesthetic appeal. I saw several soumak khorjins at recent auctions, and the cheapest of them had a buyer's premium similar to what I've paid (hammer price + shipping) for the the mafrash panels. The khorjins were generally in better condition, but I'm not convinced the aesthetics were as good.

Sue, I partially agree with you. Khorjin faces are more likely than mafrash to be killer, jaw dropping examples. I just haven't seen a mafrash that hits that level. But, artistically, I don't see mafrash as incomplete. If you took someone who appreciated art, but knew nothing about Caucasian flatweaves, I doubt he'd notice that mafrash panels were part of a larger whole. Except for the side borders, each panel is contained, and the designs are similar on each side. One could argue that khorjin faces are incomplete, but I see those hitting higher prices than any complete mafrash I've seen.

As to why collectors don't like mafrash, I think it's two factors:
1. No killer examples. There aren't insanely good mafrash panels to put on the cover of Hali, or to feature in an exhibition. That lack of advertising and acknowledgment that these things are worth collecting naturally deters people from spending money on them. I've seen mafrash that are 8s and 9s, but no 10s. I'm not rich, so am happy to have 8s and 9s, but top-dollar collectors understandably want the very best.

2. There are a ton of mafrash panels out there. There are two effects, one is the obvious supply and demand curve. The other is more subtle: collectors seem to like the rare, so a large supply actually directly suppresses demand. If 95% of the existing mafrash were destroyed, I predict we would see them appear in auctions. I feel there is a similar effect in the Turkoman community, where I see Yomud and Ersari weavings as the most aesthetically pleasing as well as the most common. However, they're considered at the bottom of the heap both in respect and in price, probably because of that very commonality. At least those are my observations based on watching ebay prices and reading a couple of books of Turkoman collections. But, my appreciation of turkoman aesthetics is somewhat lacking, so if a Turkomaniac wants to chime in it would be appreciated.


joe

Hi Joe,

Your comments about the Kazak/Kozak, etc., ring a faint bell. Whatever the connection, it is odd that there would be similarities, with the Bergamos coming from the Eastern end of Turkey. I have always thought some of the popular Kazak types seemed a little contrived, or "adopted." I'll probably get lynched for that remark, and justly so, too.

I agree that there is less spectacular variety in the mafrash panels than one can find in Khorjins; but to the extent the former genre is neglected by collectors, there is an opportunity there. Grab 'em while they're hot.

Hello All,
One feature of mafrash pieces that I find interesting is the varied types of weaving: slit-tapestry, soumak, countered soumak, various "reverse soumaks", brocading, and so forth. It's a real education for me. For those who respond to rarity, I think pile mafrash pieces are relatively scarce - at least ones from the Caucasus. This Shahsavan example I found especially appealing:



Good references include "Mafrash", by Azadi and Andrews, "Sumak Bags", by John Wertime, and "Flatwoven Rugs and Textiles of the Caucasus", by Robert Nooter. Jenny Housego's "Tribal Rugs" also has some attractive examples.

Best New Year wishes to all,

Lloyd Kannenberg

Steve,

What I mean is that the design and weaving problems of the best mafrash panels required a much lower level of thought than was required in the best khojin panels, who's most advanced examples were designed from the center outwards. Anyone who could design and weave a good khojin could design and weave a good mafrash.
A good mafrash designer and weaver would need quite a bit more training and talent to pull off a good khojin, though. From my perspective, as someone trying to learn from the masters, I, in general, look at mafrash as grade school/high school lessons, repeat pattern khojins as high school/college lessons, and non-repeat pattern khojins as graduate school lessons. It is impossible, as a diligent hands-on student, to miss the syllabus.

Joe,

I don't mean that mafrash panels are incomplete because they are no longer bags but that their design patterns, in theory, that is if the looms were long enough, could be extended by repeating, infinitely, with no further thought than what was previously worked out for the few repeats needed to make a panel. Sue

Hi Sue

Your position has morphed from dismissal of mafrash as "yardage goods" to one expressing the belief that the women who wove khorjins were, somehow, intellectually superior to those who wove mafrash. In fact, the same women probably wove both and very few of them designed what they wove.

Your assertion that the best khojin panels, who's most advanced examples were designed from the center outwards, is presented with an air of complete confidence. But there probably isn't a shred of evidence to support it - it is simply an ad hoc hypothesis masquerading as a fact.

Steve Price

Steve,

It seems you have misunderstood what I said. I said nothing about weavers intellect. I was talking about a learning curve in weaving and design problems that is detectable in weavings. If you want to think that that is impossible and that comparing mafrash panels to khojin panels isn't an apples and oranges comparison it's ok with me. This is your symposium on what to collect not mine. What collectors want to collect is none of my business. My lips are now sealed on the subject. Sue

Hi Sue

I've read your post over again several times, and I think I understood what it says. Maybe that wasnt your intent, but it says that weaving mafrash requires a much lower level of thought and that to weave good khorjin would need quite a bit more training and talent. You went on to say, that you consider mafrash as grade school/high school lessons, repeat pattern khojins as high school/college lessons, and non-repeat pattern khojins as graduate school lessons. You don't use the word "intellect", and maybe that's the wrong word. But you do refer to talent, and levels of achievement in academic terms.

And your claim that the best khorjin were designed from the center outwards, in contrast to mafrash, is nonsense.

Steve Price

Hello Joe,

That Bergama of yours is absolutely beautiful! If I could find a piece like that, Bergama or Kazak, I would love it just the same!

It seems that Kazak pieces tend to have more muted, toned down colors than the Bergama ones.

Now that you have taken more photos of that Bergama, I truly love the deeper, darker colors more! Also, the designs are spectacular. I haven't come across anything that looks even remotely close to your treasure.

I haven't done any research on the Bordjalou Kazaks but, will do so in the near future.

Thank you for sharing the new info, and photos,
Taj Nadar