Sunday, May 19, 2013

Our Last Day

By Marin Hanson
Curator of Exhibitions

On our final day in China, we went to two more antiques markets in the hope that we might find some patchwork. We knew it was a long shot, and in the end we hardly saw any textiles at all.


One market, however, was right outside the gates of Ba Xian An, Xi'an's Daoist Temple. It was a beautiful temple, and very well cared for.



Some old folks were practicing some tai ji quan under the shade of ginkgo trees and many people were there to pray and burn incense -- it was quite peaceful.

The other market we went to had dozens of stalls, but many of them had exactly the same things. We did a little souvenir shopping, but overall it was disappointing that they had no textiles.

But none of this takes away from the overall success of our research trip. We will be leaving China tomorrow with so many wonderful experiences under our belt. Most importantly, we now have a greater understanding of not only what patchwork from this part of China looks like, but who makes it, and how and where they make it.

 

Further, we now have an idea of what kinds of research questions we may want to pursue in the future and we have a fantastic partner to work with as we move forward, the Art Museum at the Xi'an Jiaotong University.

Cheers from Xi'an! You'll hear more from us later this week.


Marin Hanson is the Curator of Exhibitions at the International Quilt Study Center & Museum at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She holds undergraduate degrees from Grinnell College and Northern Illinois University and earned her MA in museum studies and textile history with a quilt studies emphasis from UNL. She is currently pursuing doctoral research on cross-cultural quiltmaking practices, with particular emphasis on China and the United States.

2 comments:

  1. I'm so glad you had a successful trip. Enjoy the journey home. The jet lag stinks.

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  2. Thanks, Michele! I'm back in the U.S. so I can actually look at our blog now (as you probably know, most blog sites are blocked in China, so we've been emailing our entries to a co-worker and she's been posting them for us). It was such a fantastic trip -- thanks for following along with us!

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