SPIRIT SHIPS AND SHIPS OF THE SOUL
NARRATIVE IMAGES ON CAMBODIAN SHIP TEXTILES
Speaker: Gillian Green

Gillian Green has a Master’s degree in Art History from the Australian National University. She wrote the book “Traditional Textiles of Cambodia” which won the RL Shep award for 2004 awarded by the Textile Society of America. She is an Honorary Research Associate in the Department of Art History and Theory, University of Sydney, Australia

Introducing
GILLIAN GREEN

Ships, either realistic or symbolic, appear on a group of antique silk weft resist-patterned textiles unique to Cambodia. The technical virtuosity evident in their weaving and their intriguing array of motifs while clearly apparent are, surprisingly, yet to be fully elucidated in terms of cultural and functional origin. One theory to be explored in this presentation is their function as hangings used in end-of-rainy season celebrations in Cambodia allied with the ceremony of ‘loy pratib’, the return of malevolent spirits to the underworld at this point in the annual agricultural cycle.