The Ancient Process of Creating Finished Products - Essay Example

A TEXTILE DESIGN ANALYSIS By Introduction Textile design involves the creation of design fabrics through weaving,knitting, or printing. A design produced by a textile designer is used mostly in interior decoration, clothing, or collectively in the fashion industry. As a process, textile design can be defined as the process of transforming a raw material such as fibre to yarn until it comes out as a finished product such as a carpet with or without imprints on it. As is the case with most contexts of visual arts, the textile industry has evolved from the ancient process of creating finished products such as translating woven textile patterns on point papers then transferring them to looms. In the contemporary textile industry, such processes have been enhanced by the incorporation of technology such as digital printing and computer-aided design (CAD) into the processes. In as much as the creating processes have undergone evolution, there are some aspects of textile design which remain intact over time. These include the inspirational factors, that is, the factors which direct a designer in creating a certain print, the creation process such as weaving or pleating, and the dyeing processes. To elaborate on this, the following study text will create an analysis of a textile object, and highlight all its constituent elements in a collective visual arts and textile design perspective. Figure 1: Untitled textile object The above object, figure1, is a finished textile object in its complete state where in its state depicts a complete woven fabric with colour imprints done on it. It is square in shape with a neat enclosing boundary around it. As one progresses inwards, there appears several patterns such as the outermost double line patterns, the inner floral patterns, and an innermost circular boundary enclosing an imprint. It seems like the initial colour of the fabric or yarn or fibre was pale beige. At each of the four corners is a square design done in chocolate brown colour. The highlights or most outstanding aspects about the textile object is a face imprinted at the centre of the fabric which is facing down towards the bottom left corner. It is done in a single deep grey colour on the background beige (Elsasser 2010, p. 134). At the bottom of the fabric, to the left, is an imprint of a woman seated with her gaze thrown to the extreme right. She has golden hair and a white robe with golden seams. Her portrait is enclosed within a circular outline with yellow and green floral patterns. Her feet are entwined with those of another to the right of the bottom corner. The figure is that of a male figure who seems to be staring up, seemingly in deep sleep. He is only clad in a waistcloth. The fabric’s surface is evenly done with no patterns formed of it; that is, it is plain. This can therefore mean that it was created by the process of plain weaving. In plain weaving (calico), the warps and wefts alternate evenly, thus they require only two harnesses. In this case, it seems plain that the weave was done by alternating the warp and weft threads at 1/1 and from it, they even look was achieved. In addition, the yarn or fibre colour might have been similar (beige) for both warps and wefts. It is also sufficient to assume that maybe the resulting weave was dyed to gain the colour, but these cannot be ascertained since no background information regarding the object’s weaving is available. The “heaviness” look of the fabric can also support that it is a plain weave since plain weaving is preferred in creating heavy yarns. In addition, a fabric intended for printing is usually done with an even surface to allow for the printing apparatus (Elsasser 2010, p. 123). These factors therefore support the creation of the fabric as being a plain weave. Still in the creation (weaving) process, the outline of the fabric seems thicker, and this acts as a binder to give and maintain its shape as intended by the weaver. The decoration of the fabric is likely to have occurred in four phases as is evident from the overlapping seen in the composition. The grey floral patterns in the fabric were printed first as all other imprints seem to be overlapping them; the inner circular boundary, and the figures imprinted at the bottom all overlap it. The next imprint decoration was the figures as they overlap the background floral patterns, and have the innermost imprint overlapping them. They are therefore in between the background floral and circular decoration. The final decoration done was the outline acting as a frame, since it overlaps all the featured imprints; it is the outermost. Apart from the phases, the printing (decoration) applied two methods of printing; screen printing, and possibly digital printing. On the screen printing context, the evidence is in the way that the floral patterns are laid out; the elements used to create the decoration are not similar, and as such, it rules out the use of a motif to create any pattern. Instead, it can be concluded that the entire design was created and translated onto the plain fabric as a single composition using screen printing in grey colour. The boundary of the inner circular print also supports that it was screen printed since there are different colours used in the constituent patterns (yellows, orange, and green). As such, different silkscreens were created, each in its own colour, and in combining them, the multi-coloured print emerged. The same applies to the centre-most face; it was screen printed in a single colour. The outermost frame lines were screen-printed in three colours and a final single-colour silk-screen used in imprinting the repeated pattern at each of the four corners. In this case, it can be concluded that this final screen was used as a motif and repeatedly used in the four corners to add to the decoration.The fine detailing of the two human figures, however, confusion as to whether it is screen or digital-printed. It is possible to achieve shading with screen printing, but the detail seen, especially in the male figure’s body and the graduating shade in the lady’s golden ribbons on her clothes is more of a digital machine print (Russel 2011, p.34). It can therefore be stated that the background (grey floral) pattern was printed first, followed by the digital printing of the two figures, the inner circle followed, and finally the outline was screen-printed to complete the decoration. By analysing the creation of the textile, one can find out what its intended function was. First of all, the square shape makes it unlikely to be used as a table cloth. This is because most tables are made in rectangular shapes and this rules it out as a suitable cover. Considering its material which is likely to be dense yarn used to create a dense and heavy fabric, it cannot be used as a light household textile object which requires regular washing (cleaning) as this would be tedious and requiring a longer time to dry up. In addition, the use of lighter colours (beige, creams, and whites) makes it unfit to be a floor mat or carpet since it would get dirty easily, show the slightest traces of dirt (Cho 2010, p.19). After ruling all these out, one remains with the option of a wall hanging. This is supported by that one, the strength of the frame boundary makes it strong enough to withstand the pull of gravity, and the overall fabric will not sag, that is becoming loose. Secondly, a wall hanging can take any shape, be it circular or square. Thirdly, the colour used is safe from dirt once hung up on the wall. Finally, the design (layout) is best viewed from a normal eye level as opposed to if it was laid down on a table as some of the decorations would be concealed from sight. In relation to the above nature of function, it can be added that the textile’s function is for aesthetic purposes. This is because the theme applied does not relate to any known religious scene or belief. Again, the central face and the two figures do not seem to have any relation, but it appears like the idea was to incorporate two different compositions together. The lower figures however are similar to the ancient paintings of earlier artists who based their themes mainly on mythology, that is, information derived from ancient beliefs on goddesses and gods from ancient Greece. All in all, or whichever theme was used in coming up with the illustration, the resulting textile product was meant for aesthetic or beautifying purposes. In the design context, the textile object adheres to most of the guides (principles) applied in creating design works. The first principle in highlight is balance which in this case is overly symmetrical. This is evident at, first of all, the shape which is a perfect square. When it comes to the layout of the illustration, the same is repeated. Each of the four corners has a pattern printed on it; the central circular imprint is placed at the midpoint of the fabric; the floral balance all over the working area; and finally, there are two figures on either side of the fabric’s bottom area. The symmetrical balance can be proven by drawing an imaginary axis vertically across the fabric’s midpoint and the result would be two equally-balanced planes. The second principle in highlight is rhythm. Rhythm in this case meaning that the layout of objects in the illustration is effective in that each object guides the viewer’s eye from one object to the other. This can be seen in the frame which takes the eye towards the bottom “frame” where the feet of the two figures meet the outer frame. From there, the eye is directed by lines towards their faces whose ends are placed adjacent to the inner floral circle. As the eye rotates round the circular frame, it gets attracted to the face at the centre of the circle. There is also a proportion in that the constituent forms are in the appropriate size of the overall textile, that is, they fit into the workspace without some being larger or smaller than others. Repetition has also been used as in the case of the motifs on the corners and some of the florals. This repetition contributes in creating the illustration. Although closely related to rhythm, there is also the principle of harmony in that the constituent elements, all work together to create one composition (Wilson 2001, p.36). Finally, it is clear that the illustration is condensed from the works of the Renaissance period in Italy. This is proven by the fact that the image of a face in the centre is similar to Leonardo da Vinci’s drawing, Study of the Leda. The other two figures at the bottom of the textile piece are both derived from Venus and Mars, a painting by Renaissance artist Sandro Botticelli. Apart from these two, it portrays additional features which place it in the contextual period of the Renaissance period. These include the use of forums related to nature. This is seen in the leaf-like patterns used, in addition to vines, and some flowers resembling human faces. Renaissance art also demanded of artists to use proportion realistically and capture the finest details of their objects. This is seen in the two figures’ bodies and clothing details. Although this is not a painting, it adheres to much of what Renaissance art dictated, and that could be the potential reason why the creator of this textile piece went for digital printing in highlighting the two figures. Concisely, its illustration is inspired by Renaissance works. Conclusion The above analysis effectively brings out the entire creation process behind the featured textile piece. Although much of its information is unavailable, evaluating its constituent elements brings much of what one needs to know about it. The weaving process for instance, was identified, and so did the way the printing or decoration was done, its colour and shape revealed its function, and finally, the featured illustration revealed that the creator was inspired by artists of the Renaissance period. In addition to these, there were the elements of textile design, and these qualify the placement of the piece as a textile one. All these interpretations were made possible by the interplay between visual arts and design cultures. Bibliography Cho, G 2010, Smart Clothing: Technology and Applications, CRC Press. Elsasser, VH 2010, Textiles: concepts and principles, New York, Fairchild Books. Russell, A 2011, The fundamentals of printed textile design, Lausanne, AVA Academia. Wilson, J 2001, Handbook of Textile Design, Cambridge: Woodhead Publishers. Read More