Textile and Carpets

Textiles and carpets incorporate stories and daily use. They make homes instantly distinctive and can be moved easily to other places. They can only exist through knowledge that is handed down, and labor that ties them to their makers and users as well as to those who may sell or buy them. These items contain several languages in which symbols, patterns, and colors reflect meanings, places, time, and events. When knotted or stitched, thread follows designs. Designs are sometimes memorized and even chanted aloud like poems or prayers. The makers follow the flow of memory and tradition, interrupting it by chance, lapse of ability, or will of transgression. Together, carpets and textiles tell stories of travels, of borders, of relations, repair, and wounds, of exposure to natural elements that may help them age or renew.

Their making is a collective activity and requires long stretches of time. It demands that time is filled not exclusively with labor but with thought and sound, with stories. It demands imagination and patience, so that time can be endured and space is not worshipped.

Like books, they have long lives and have been traveling from one end of the planet to the other long before any communication technology came into existence. Bookhouse has made room for them and for their makers, users, and readers.