National Museum, WV weavers promote PH’s Piña-Seda in Southeast Asia, Europe

THE National Museum of the Philippines (NMP) together with the weavers from Aklan and Antique provinces are in Thailand and Czech Republic promoting the country’s age-old tradition of piña weaving and embroidery.

National Museum’s travelling exhibition, Piña-Seda Pineapple and Silk Cloths from the Tropics, opened on July 4 at the Museum Siam in Bangkok, Thailand and July 15 at the National Museum-Náprstek Museum of Asian, African and American Cultures in Prague, Czech Republic.

The program in Bangkok is in partnership with the Office of Congresswoman Loren Legarda and the National Discovery Museum Institute and will run until July 27, 2019 while the one in Prague is in partnership with the Office of Congresswoman Legarda and the Philippine Embassy in Prague and will run until August 12, 2019.

The travelling exhibition and corollary programs highlight piña as a traditional and unique source of fiber in the Philippines, demonstrating the intricate features of the Filipino textile weaving and hand-embroidery heritage.

“Through the travelling exhibition, the NMP aims to establish networks and promote Filipino culture to a global audience of heritage professionals, textile enthusiasts and researchers, and to the Filipino communities abroad,” explained NMP Assistant Director Ana Maria Theresa P. Labrador, who also heads the Hibla ng Lahing Filipino Program.

Dr. Labrador underscored the important roles of the weavers and embroiders as culture-bearers.  “Our weavers and embroiderers are the keepers of Filipino tradition of weaving and embroidery – these are skills that have been passed from one generation of Filipino to another. Through this program, the National Museum is hopeful that these traditions that form part of our heritage will not be erased in the collective memory of the Filipino people – regardless where they are in the world,” she said.

Prague is the third destination of the Hibla ng Lahing Filipino Travelling Exhibition in Asia, Europe and Americas for 2019 and the 10^th destination from the first travelling exhibition at the Philippine Embassy in London in October 2017. Bangkok, on the other hand, was the second destination in Asia, next to Tokyo, Japan. Through the partnership with the different Philippine Service Posts and partner institutions abroad, the travelling exhibition was brought to six destinations in 2018 including Lisbon, Madrid, Frankfurt, Washington, New York and Honolulu.

 

WORKSHOPS, DEMOS, LECTURES

Aside from the exhibition, there are corollary activities such as piña fiber scraping, knotting and weaving demonstrations, and embroidery workshops. From these activities, the guests learn the basics of piña weaving and embroidery. Using the embroidery kits provided by the NMP, participants embroider their own piña handkerchief starting with choosing the pattern and tracing it in the fabric. The guests were also given the chance to extract the coarser (bastos) and finer (liniwan) piña fiber from the Red Spanish pineapple leaves using a broken ceramic plate. Those who want to try the actual weaving did so with the assistance of the expert weavers.

Expert piña weavers Cerila Crisostomo and Gemma Tomolin of Tibiao, Antique and Raquel Eliserio and Carlo Eliserio of Balete, Aklan, together with expert hand-embroiderers Josefina Llamoso, Rosalina Talavero, Loreto Maestre Jr. and Lolita Pereza facilitated the piña fiber scraping, knotting and weaving demonstrations, and embroidery workshops while Dr. Labrador led the lecture series on topics about the context of this program, Philippine indigenous fibers and Filipino textile weaving and hand-embroidery heritage.

Crisostomo is the president of Tibiao Active Weavers and Knotters Association while Tomolin is the president of Malabor Abaca-Piña Weaving Association in Tibiao. The associations, aside from providing employment to more than 50 self-earning individuals in Tibiao, are active in promoting the handwoven textile of their town. On the other hand, the Eliserios are entrepreneurs, trainors, weavers and piña leaf scrapers from Aklan who advocate the revival of handwoven textiles in their province by employing self-earning individuals in their community.

WEAVING

Weaving is an age-old tradition in Panay. Aside from piña, Western Visayas is also known for its handwoven products made of cotton, abaca, and silk. In the past, handwoven textiles have brought fame and fortune to Panay with Iloilo considered as the country’s textile capital when the industry reached its peak in the 19^th century. In the 1860s, Iloilo reportedly exported $400,000 worth of piña, silk, and other fabrics to Manila and P400,000 worth of cotton and silk sarong and kerchiefs to Leyte and Samar. The hablon, patadyong, and piña cloth from the island were featured in La Exposicion de Filipinas in Spain in 1857 and the precious textile items are now part of the collection of the Museo Nacional de Antropologia in Madrid.

The weaving industry in Panay declined for various reasons – entry of cheaper, imported machine-manufactured textiles, shift in labor demand to sugar industry, among others. But in recent years, the government and the private sector have been active in reviving the industry. For instance, weavers in Western Visayas have been receiving support from various government agencies like the Department of Trade and Industry, Philippine Fiber Industry Development Authority, Philippine Textile Research Institute, National Commission for Culture and the Arts, local government units, among others. The support came in the form of business capital, provision of equipment and raw materials, promotion and marketing of products in the domestic and international markets, and training of weavers to make their skills more competitive. This support is enhanced by partnerships with the private sector here in the Philippines and abroad particularly the fashion and textile sectors.

On its part, the NMP and the Office of former senator now Antique RepresentativeLegarda are at the forefront in the promotion, preservation and protection of Philippine indigenous fibers and handwoven textiles. The product of this active partnership is the Hibla ng Lahing Filipino permanent textile gallery at the National Museum of Anthropology in Manila and the textiles galleries in NMP regional museums in Ilocos and Iloilo, in 2017 and 2018, respectively. This year, three more regional and site museum galleries on textile will be opened.

Since the opening of Hibla in 2012, the NMP has been holding corollary activities like lecture series on Philippine Traditional Textiles and weaving and embroidery demonstration as part of its educational program. Through Hibla and these corollary activities, the NMP brings into a wider audience the Filipino textile heritage. It is not only a venue of the exhibitions but is an important space for the public to learn about, appreciate and nurture Filipino craftsmanship and artistry as seen in the beautifully woven textiles and fabrics from the different regions of the country. The textile exhibitions entice the museum-goers to see the similarities instead of the differences in patterns, designs, colors, etc. and discover the shared practices of Filipinos related to textiles.

“From birth to death, handmade textiles figure prominently among many indigenous Filipinos. Being swaddled in cloth after birth, infants experience the comfort of warmth and safety in even the most ordinary material,” said Dr. Labrador. Even in funerary practices, handwoven textiles also have a role. “Dressed in special garments, shrouded in fine, trade textiles or dyed in highly prized blue-black indigo, death was only a transition to another life or to another world. This is the connection with our belief in ancestor-worship and textiles are the ties that bind us from one generation to the next, from this world to the next,” she said. (Text & Photos by National Museum of the Philippines)