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Tongan

Wrapper or furnishing fabric, 1800s

Description

Maker

Culture

Tongan

Title

Wrapper or furnishing fabric

Year

1800s

Medium

Beaten bark fiber, burnishing with pigment

Dimensions

109.2 x 170.2 cm (43 x 67 inches)

Type

Credit

Museum Collection

Object Number

46.329

Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Cloth Without Weaving

November 1, 2000 - February 18, 2001

One method of decorating ngatu, the Tongan term for barkcloth, employs sewn strips of leaf ribs arranged in a pattern and attached to a board. The barkcloth sheet is placed over the design board, known as a kupesi, and pigment is rubbed onto the sheet. The pattern of the leaf ribs is burnished into the sheet. The plain border is typical of Tongan ngatu.

Use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in the public domain (CC0 1.0). This object is Wrapper or furnishing fabric with the accession number of 46.329. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.