Woman's wrapper c. 20th century

This is a woman’s wrapper, made by Kabui Naga, and it’s a textile, so you know it’s all about process. It's a kind of record of how it came to be. The overall layout is pretty simple: some vertical stripes, some horizontal, and the color palette is very elemental: red, white, and black. There's something grounding and beautiful about such simplicity. When I look closer, I see how the white bands are not perfect, they seem to have been hand-woven or -dyed. The colours wobble a little. They’re not mechanically reproduced. It’s these areas that pull me in, because they tell me that someone, or someones, handled this piece and made it with their hands. I think about the work of Sophie Taeuber-Arp and her tapestries. There’s something similar, a balance of formality and then, a very particular humanness. Ultimately, this piece reminds us that art is a conversation.