Weaving “National Spirit”: Jacquard-Woven Silk Images in the Nanjing Decade (1927–1937)

Authors

Brielle Pizzala, Bard Graduate CenterFollow

Date of this Version

2024

Document Type

Presentation

Citation

Textile Society of America 2024 Symposium

Shifts & Strands: Rethinking the Possibilities and Potentials of Textiles, November 12-17, 2024, a virtual event

Student/New Professional Award recipient

Comments

Published by the Textiles Society of America

Copyright 2024, the author. Used by permission

Abstract

Industrial silk factories in Hangzhou and Shanghai represent active efforts to modernize and weave together the turbulent Republic of China (1912–1949). The Guomindang government, under Chiang Kai-Shek (1887–1975), acculturated modernity, as demonstrated by the silk industry, to unite China and secure the nation from trans-colonial threats, including economic security. Countless silk reelers, weavers, and businessmen in China, altered traditional sericulture with imported industry and ideologies in order to secure national autonomy. Imported steam reeling and jacquard loom factories became means to secure economic survival and national autonomy during this anxious and extremely political period. How did creating silk tapestries materialize modernity and nationalism?

“Geese” or “A Flock in a Thicket” (qun yi zhong cong, 羣一中叢) from Du Jinsheng Factory is my central case study for tapestries from this era. This under studied tapestry demonstrates the tensions between intra-national and inter-national anxieties that permeate efforts of modernization within and around the silk industry. It is a woven reproductions of photographs that naturalistically depict “bird and flower” style imagery. “Geese'' exemplifies the international cosmopolitanism of businessmen, as the image is based on an award-winning photograph by the Hungarian photographer Ernõ Vadas. By utilizing the briefly iconic image, the Du Jinsheng Factory is demonstrating Chinese participation in global discourse and political alignment with Hungarian irredentism. The weavers alter the image, mirroring the silk industry’s adoption and adaptation of Western machinery.