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Textile Art: The Ancient Practice That Continues to Reinvent Itself

Textile Art: The Ancient Practice That Continues to Reinvent Itself

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We come into contact with textile art every day. From the clothes we wear to the objects that decorate our home, it’s an art that can be simultaneously beautiful and useful. But it should come as no surprise that this field occupies these two categories. At the beginning of its long history, textiles were seen as a utility rather than something that serves no discernible function aside from aesthetics. And while this is still the case today, visionary creatives have helped the art continually reinvent itself.

History

Textile art is one of the oldest forms of art in human civilization. At its inception, it was not focused on looks, but for practical purposes—such as clothing or blankets to keep warm. This dates all the way back to prehistoric times, and anthropologists estimate that this is between 100,000 to 500,000 years ago. These goods were made from animal skins, furs, leaves, and more.

The history of hand-knitting

The history of hand-knitting

• The History of knitting
  

While the origins of knitting are unclear, we know it has been practised in many different parts of the world, over many centuries, producing objects of great beauty as well as items fulfilling practical needs. When done by hand, it has used simple tools, such as hand-carved sticks of wood, bone, quill and ivory or metal wires and fine steel knitting needles that were commonplace in the 19th century.

The earliest examples of hand-knitting

Hand-knitting today is most closely associated with flat-knitting, which is worked in rows using two knitting needles and where the piece is turned from front to back on each row. But there is also a long history of knitting 'in the round'. Here, four or five needles are used to create a continuous seamless tube – a technique particularly used for caps, stockings and gloves. Today's dominance of flat-knitting is partly because it's easier to represent on construction charts and patterns.

An early woollen item in our collection is a pair of socks from Egypt that date from the 3rd to 5th century AD. They have been made using the technique 'nålbindning', a laborious technique more akin to sewing than knitting, where yarn is threaded through the eye of a sewing needle and then worked in the round through a series of loops. Some believe that this technique was a forerunner of the faster method of knitting with two or more needles.

Pair of socks, 250 – 420, Egypt. Museum no. 2085&A-1900. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London