Kinran

In a previous post about purple donsu, I mentioned that I had two pieces of Japanese weaving called 'kinran'. One job on my long-term to-do list is to write these up as pieces of weaving for the Japanese Textile Group of Complex Weavers. Since the builders stopped me doing any of the things on today's list, I thought I would dig the two pieces out and start the write up. This involved examining them through a microscope and counting threads per 5 mm. The orange piece has a warp of 150 epi in orange silk. Each warp 'thread' is 6 to 8 single filaments laid side by side - no plying, no twist. The weft is similar but thicker and is woven at about 60ppi. The weaving of the background is in orange silk every where and is a 2 and 1 twill. The pattern wefts are thicker and there is a silk paper thread which is 0.25 mm wide. The wefts in the photo are running diagonally lower right to upper left.

You can see the tie-downs are quite far apart compared to the background orange weave. The tie-downs are just some of the warp threads. The pattern threads go right across the fabric and when they are underneath the fabric, they are also held by some of the warp threads (see second photo). I think this has been woven on a Japanese type of drawloom.

The biggest surprise was when I came to examine the off-white lining which I assumed was a fine cotton (as the second one is). Not a bit of it. It is woven at 100 epi and is not cotton. It has a white-on-white pattern of flowers and leaves. The steel ruler is in the photo to give scale but also to focus on. It was really difficult to get an image. Scanning was no use at all and I have cheated with Photoshop on the colour to bring out the pattern. The real colour is off-white. It has the appearance and high gloss of old much-washed-and-ironed linen like a 1920s linen tablecloth I have. The Japanese use hemp, ramie,   linen  and  other vegetable fibres. To me, the lining seems much older than the silk kinran which is probably post 1930s. The more I think about it, the more I value the lining! The seller (Ichiroya) did not mention it. You could spin fine enough linen for this but I do not know about ramie or hemp.

The other uchishiki is done in much the same manner but has a  brown warp of 100 epi and a balck weft of about 80 ppi. It is difficult to make out because of the colours in the background but I think it is a 3 and 1 twill. And the lining is a fine but dull white cotton.

So that's one job done. The article needs to have its spelling checked and I need to check on ramie and hemp.

Why Purple Donsu

I belong to  a group which studies Japanese textiles. In the past, I have even been into the V&A Study rooms to look at a book of Okinawan samples and subsequently  wove a piece of silk as a replica of one sample.  My version is in silk at 60 epi but the original was 90 to 100 epi.

My current interest in donsu was  stirred up by the group leader, Rod Byatt, from his remarks on  Meibutsugire. This Japanese word seems to translate as 'Famed Fabrics' or perhaps 'Named Fabrics'. These are small pieces of precious fabric which have been made into containers for the precious articles used in the Tea Ceremony. I was taken with two types of  woven fabric.

These are two pieces of KINRAN which have been used in Buddhist ceremonies. It is a type of woven inlay but not like Theo Moorman technique. On close examination, the gold paper thread about 1 mm wide, is laid right across the fabric from side to side. Where it does not show in the pattern on the front, it just disappears behind. A friend is getting me some gold paper thread from Japan and I shall have a go at this.

The other type is DONSU. A trawl on the web will not get much that is helpful on donsu. It  originated in China and it is a small repeating pattern of polychrome damask. It is used as surrounding mount for pictures.  I do not own a piece - yet! But I have feelers out. This means I do not have any photos of my own.

There are photos in the following books

1.  Meibutsugire (Kyoto Shoin's Art Library of Japanese Textiles, No 19).
2. Susan-Marie Best, ' Meibutsu-gire. Fabrics in the Japanese Tea Cermeony', P136ff in  “Silk and stone: the art of Asia” (1996, hardback, ISBN10 1898113203).
   
   
   
   
   
   There is also what sounds like a useful article in Chanoyu Quarterly, Issue No 17, 1977. The article is by Kitamura Tokusai and is 'An Introduction to Donsu'. I will try the British Library.
   
   
   
   

Japanese Tea Mart RIKYU sells tea containers and, in some cases, the shifuku or fabric covers, with them. The fabrics are not categorised so I am guessing that they are both donsu.

The striped one does have areas which are 'drawloom-like' and that seems to be quite common in the higher class of donsu.

So that explains the donsu. The purple comes from my favourite which is gold weft on a purple warp and is Figure 12 in Reference 2 above.