LONDON.- The Fashion and Textile Museum presents Textiles: The Art of Mankind a celebration of the ancient and deep entanglement between textiles, people and our world. The exhibition brings together a vibrant collection of beautiful and unexpected objects from around the world that tell stories, communicate human individuality, celebrate our relationship with animals and express symbolic thought through pattern.

With many works drawn from the Jo Ann C. Stabb Design Collection, from the University of California Davis, this is a unique opportunity to see a stunning range of items never before exhibited in the UK.

Beginning with an exploration of the importance of textiles to our society and the materials and techniques used in their creation, the main galleries go on to show how textiles communicate individuality and how across time and geography textiles have articulated ‘this is who I am and this is what I believe’.

With colourful garments, fabric and accessories from diverse cultures on show we see how textiles – our ‘second skin’ can symbolise our office, authority or belief systems. A wedding dress from Egypt embellished with mother of pearl, silk embroidery and cowry shells is seen alongside a Thai Singing Shawl designed to be worn at a funeral and decorated with beetle wings. An appliqued Turkmen Tribal coat and a Bolivian fiesta hat show how textiles can signify belonging and mark occasions. Stunning ethnographical garments, panels and ceremonial clothing from Japan, China, Afghanistan, Guatemala, Nigeria and India are juxtaposed with modern Western dress and textiles such as a logoed golfers’ cap and an embroidered panel celebrating the lesbian and gay support of the 1980s miners’ strike.

As well as giving us a sense of identity, textiles have for millennia chosen to depict humans figuratively. Long before photography and the advent of the selfie, textiles were the main carriers of imagery and not surprisingly they chose to show the human form. These were often not individual portraits, but representations of mythological or revered beings. Some held sacred significance whilst others symbolised life’s mysteries or celebrated the bravery of hunters and kings. Items on display range from a delicate, hand-painted Chinese silk-tapestry scroll, depicting a legendary swordswoman to panels from the Ivory Coast showing hunters in earth pigment on hand-spun cotton canvas.

Animals in both two- and three-dimensional forms are also a recurring theme in the story of textiles. Once part of early mythologies but equally part of daily human life, our love of animals is evident across textiles and the exhibition showcases domestic, mythical and wild animals in a huge range of formats. Animals may have auspicious meanings; many are thought to bring good luck, and strong swift animals can represent virility, strength and good health. Often believed to have supernatural powers that link heaven and earth, some animals are imbued with totemic status, acting as spirit guides whilst others became cultural emblems or official national symbols.

Many beautiful images of birds will be exhibited, including a 19th century Chinese quail among clouds, stitched in silk floss and gold thread; an immortal peacock door hanging from Thailand and a vivid hand-printed Indian bird scarf. Crocodiles are depicted in both contemporary Aboriginal work and in 3D artefacts from India that highlight the threat of water pollution and commercial farming to this sacred animal. Fine ecru linen-lace from Italy features the gentle deer whilst batik garments from West Africa show stylised bats that represent the power to communicate with the spirit world. Mythical beasts like dragons are also present, as well as appliqued iguanas and tortoises, Tibetan snow leopard puppets and the lucky Chinese goldfish, butterflies and crabs that adorn a silk collar. A whole range of sculptural plaited animals will be displayed including a miniature purple pig from Ecuador made from twined straw.

The exhibition continues in the upper galleries with an exploration of abstract pattern in textiles, show-casing exquisite Ikat, plaid, gingham and tartan patterns from across the globe. Abstract patterns are often seen to represent symbolic ideas with the vertical lines suggesting new growth and the horizontal lines representing cooling winds in the warp and weft of a length of an Indian sari fabric, whilst the shapes in a red and orange Peruvian poncho represent the relationship between the physical and spiritual worlds. In addition, the science and technology behind dyeing, the loom, knitting patterns and 3D printing are explored alongside ideas of waste not, want not and recycling that date back to ancient practices.

Textile making is often a collaborative process, with many hands involved in the production of one piece and the role that collaborative making can have on our wellbeing is increasingly recognised.

A display in Fashion and Textile Studios Connecting Threads, takes the story into modern times with the work of renowned textile artist Lynn Setterington. Lynn has been working in textiles since the 1980s. Her early colourful pieces show her journey from a Yorkshire village to the multi-cultural streets of Brixton in a series of small embroidered vignettes. Her later work shows a gradual move to collaborative practice starting with the influence of the Kantha, a Bangladeshi hand-stitched quilt and her work with an Asian women’s group. Her career has spanned over 40 years with collaborations and commissions from quilts, costumes and samplers to major installations and artworks. Her practice reflects on social issues of sustainability and consumerism. Many of her collaborative projects have brought together communities, built bridges and tackled mental health issues. Through textiles Lynn challenges contemporary issues in society and shows how stitch can be used to commemorate people and communities.