WASHINGTON, DC.- Register now to reserve your space for the first virtual Cotsen Textile Traces Global Roundtable on October 21, 10-1 ET and October 22, 1-4 ET, when experts from around the world will share insights about exceptional textile fragments representing Asia, Europe-Central Asia, Africa, Americas, and Oceania from the Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection at the George Washington Museum and The Textile Museum in Washington, DC.

A robe made from more than one-hundred block-printed Indian textile fragments for export to Indonesia, a Sasanian silk fragment carbon dated to 338-596, an embroidered raffia Kuba hat from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a fragment from a Wari-style Peruvian tunic, a contemporary construction from Lloyd Cotsen’s “Box Project” inspired by scaffold weaves from Peru, and Captain Cook’s sample book of tapa cloth from Hawaii, all found in the Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection, are among the inspirations for the first virtual Cotsen Textile Traces Global Roundtable organized by the new Cotsen Textile Traces Study Center.

These fragments and other works will be discussed, contextualized, and compared with similar textiles from other collections by sixteen distinguished textile artists, conservators, and scholars from five continents in one-hour panels over two days. Registration is free and the event is open to the public. Registrants will receive links for joining each day of the roundtable on Zoom, as well as a full program with a detailed schedule, abstracts, and biographies of the experts. Time will be allowed for attendees to ask questions to the experts during each panel.

The Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection represents a lifetime of collecting by business leader and philanthropist Lloyd Cotsen. Comprised of nearly 4,000 fragments from all over the world, the collection offers insights into human creativity from antiquity to the present. Cornerstones of the collection include fragments from Japan, China, pre-Columbian Peru, and 16th- to 18th-century Europe. The entire collection is available online and works are featured throughout the week on Instagram @cotsentextiles.

This inaugural roundtable commemorates the donation of the Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection and seeks to encourage textile research, facilitate critical discussion, support cultural diversity, and preserve cultural heritage by making direct connections between collection objects and current research and art-making.

The schedule follows:




Wednesday, October 21, 10 a.m.-1 p.m
Panel 1: 10–11 a.m. ET
Introducing the Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection and Center
Marie-Eve Celio-Scheurer, academic coordinator, Cotsen Textile Traces Study Center, Washington, DC
Lyssa Stapleton, curator, Cotsen Collection in Los Angeles, CA
John Wetenhall, director, George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum, Washington, DC

Panel 2: 11 a.m.–12 p.m. ET
Indian Block-Printing Traditions
Ruth Barnes, curator, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT
Ruchira Ghose, former director, National Crafts Museum in New Delhi, India
Mushtak Khan, former deputy director, National Crafts Museum in New Delhi, India

Panel 3: 12–1 p.m. ET
Connecting Fragments: Silk Conservation
Maria Fusco, chief conservator, George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum, Washington, DC
Hélène Dubuis, conservator, Abbeg Stiftung, Riggisberg, Switzerland

Thursday, October 22, 1-4 p.m.

Panel 4: 1–2 p.m. ET
Kuba’s Living Traditions
Kevin Tervala, curator of African art, Baltimore Museum of Art, MD
Vanessa Drake Moraga, independent scholar and curator, Berkeley, CA
Mireielle Asia Nyembo, artist, Democratic Republic of the Congo

Panel 5: 2–3 p.m. ET
Weaving and Dyeing in South America and Mesoamerica
Jim Bassler, artist, CA
Elena Phipps, independent scholar, NY and CA
Alejandro de Avila Blomberg, director, Jardín Etnobotánico de Oaxaca and Museo Textil de Oaxaca, Mexico

Panel 6: 3–4 p.m. ET
The Sample Book of Captain Cook and Tapa Cloth Today
Adrienne Kaeppler, curator of Oceanic Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
Kamalu de Preez, ethnology assistant collections manager, Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum in Honolulu, Hawaii