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This fragment is part of the "CulturalxCollabs - Weaving the Future" carpet.
Through the fragment we trace the journey of the fragment owners and their collabs as they explore, experiment and creatively advance socially relevant themes. Here is the fragment as we are sending it on this three and a half-year journey.
Follow this story to observe the transformations the fragment undergoes over the course of these years...
...AND ON WE GO...
...with Sheila O'Sullivan
My journey with the CulturalxCollabs project and the Dragon Carpet started in Berlin in May 2024 where I first heard about the project during a behind the scenes visit to the workshops of the Carpet Team at the Museum for Islamic Art. I was with friends who had been lent Fragment #33 of the Dragon Carpet for the purposes of the project. I was passed Fragment #33 several weeks later when these friends visited me in Lewes in the United Kingdom.
When the Fragment arrived, I invited a few friends and neighbours to my house to look at the Fragment and to learn about the project.
Whilst Fragment #33 was in my home, I began to think...
...about some of carpets that I have owned over the years as well as those belonging to friends which I have admired - their history and by whom and how they were made. Often we simply don’t know. They are works of art, just like the paintings that we hang on our walls. They are the creation of individuals, sometimes of families and occasionally the work of whole villages.
The home of the Fragment in Lewes during the months it spent with me was on a window sill alongside other things that I admire and want to share the pleasure of with neighbours and other people passing by along the street where I live.
The Fragment inspired me to find out about the carpets belonging to friends - their history and how and why they purchased it. What was very apparent was how they admired the colours and the design of their carpets together with an appreciation of the skill involved in their making. Some of my friends had wanted to find an item that was unique and sought them out in flea markets and antique shops, whilst others had bought theirs whist on holiday in Turkey or in bazaars in the Middle East. We all shared stories of spending time talking to shop keepers eager for visitors to purchase a carpet and keen to tell us their history. No-one ever regretted their not so impulsive holiday purchase!
Memorable stories
Alfred Messel, Pergamon Museum Architect
One Sunday afternoon I sat with an artist friend looking at the Fragment, eating lunch and talking about carpets and the Fragment Project. To my great surprise she told me that her great uncle was Alfred Messel - the architect who designed the Pergamon Museum. And, that he was the brother of Ludwig Ernest Wilhelm Leonard Messel who was a member of a German Jewish banking family. Ludwig settled in England in 1890 buying the Nymans estate which is a house with 243 hectares (600 acres) of land near where we live in Lewes, Sussex. Alfred had visited Nymans where his brother asked him to transform Nymans House from its original Regency style to a more Hanoverian design. I wondered about what were Alfred’s thoughts when he designed the Pergamon Museum - was he aware of the collections it would eventually store and become a custodian of?
From Berlin to London and the Brighton (Kemp Town) Book Group
Viv has a number of carpets in her home that she shared with her late husband Henry. It is also where my book club or reading group meets. The carpets have been admired over the years. They together with the furniture in the house were brought from Berlin to London before September, 1939. Carpets, like people, travel during their lives – just the Dragon Carpet and just like the Fragments of the Dragon Carpet are doing now.
The story of Fragment #33 again trigged stories. Ann remembered meeting some Turkish people weaving and selling carpets in Melbourne, Australia and using the knowledge and skills that they brought with them from Turkey. For Ann, this meeting led to a life-long fascination and interest in oriental carpets.
Another member of the book club, Jeremy, remembered the time he had spent listening and then eventually buying a carpet on a holiday in Turkey. Another carpet bought under some pressure or persuasion, but never regretted. It is now loved by all in his home including by his pet greyhound.
A Wedding Gift, and a recent purchase
Michael, an artist, worked and lived in Palestine in the 1980s and has a deep admiration of the design, patterning and colour of oriental carpets. He enjoys sitting on his carpets in the evening because of their softness and he feels close to them as they summon up memories of sitting and talking and eating with friends during his life in Palestine. He shared the history of one caret which had been given to him and his wife by his parents as a wedding gift over 30 years ago. The carpet had been brought in Shrewsbury and his parents had felt that it was felt an appropriate present for him and his Palestine wife. The colours of the carpet are still as vibrant and as interesting as they were when the carpet was given. Sadly, no detail of its prior history are known.
While recounting the story Michael brought out a catalogue from the auction house Sothebys that included wonderful examples and descriptions of carpets sold in in Dubai in 1985. We then looked at and admired a recent purchase from the local auction house in Lewes. The carpet had been bought because of its colourful and varied design. But who had owned it previously and where was it woven?
There are always questions when you see a carpet. Where was it made, who made it, who has owned it over the years and for what purposes? Many questions that it is not always possible to answer. These ‘antiques of today and tomorrow’ are utilitarian but are now often regarded as works of art. They adorn our homes, but they also play a functional role. Carpets, though, also have a social aspect – bringing families and friends and people together – whether to share food or a story. And this, is certainly, true of Fragment #33 on its journey through Lewes in the summer of 2024.
An Interior Designer and Carpets
Neil Masters, is a neighbour and interior designer. I wanted to ask Neil what carpets meant to him and how they were used in his profession. A key reason was to add softness especially modern interiors when clients want use materials such as glass, chrome, stone or marble which are hard surfaces and carpets can add a warmth and softness and add balance. He has commissioned carpets for some clients, some from Christine Van de Hurd. Often using silk like in Fragment #33 which he admired.
In his own home, which he shares with this partner, carpets form a focal point especially in seating areas. They also give a sense of warmth on wooden floors. Neil and his partner have visited Berlin and its many museums; the Museum for Islamic Art will definitely be on their list of museums to visit when they are next in Berlin.
The journey begins...
...with Christoph Selig
I was fascinated from the very beginning. Being part of it and helping to make it happen is an honor. It is exciting to see how far the little fragments travel, what they see and what stories they will bring back.
It was a long journey: from the kick-off in Berlin, to our home, to friends in Norway, back to Berlin, as something to sit on for the cat, to Singapore and back and finally to the UK to find a new home!
Front and Back
About the Project
The Museum for Islamic Art's project, #CulturalxCollabs - Weaving the future, celebrates the transformative power of cultural exchange and the shared threads that unite us all. All the things we love, have loved and will ever love come from cultural exchange, migration and diversity, or as we like to call it #CulturalxCollabs.
100 carpet fragments, cut from a replica of the iconic dragon carpet, will travel the world (delivered by DHL). The fragments will ignite #CulturalxCollabs with co-creators, inspiring human ingenuity, fostering community and ultimately demonstrating how cultural exchange enriches all our lives.
Follow #CulturalxCollabs on Instagram as the project unfolds...
...or learn more here
Weaving the Future
Join us on a journey with 100 carpet fragments as they travel around the world for three and a half years, finding temporary homes while bridging cultural boundaries, fostering worldwide community united by the power of human stories.
Fragment Journeys
100 carpet fragments part of the "CulturalxCollabs - Weaving the Future" project. Follow their journeys through the ever changing owners' over three and a half years.
Where is the Dragon?
The star of the "CulturalxCollabs - Weaving the Future" project is a so-called Caucasian dragon carpet from the 17th century. A dragon carpet - all well and good - but: where is the dragon?
