venue: THE TEXTILE SOCIETY for the
study of the history, art and design of textiles - http://www.textilesociety.org.uk/
Natalie Rothstein Silk Symposium and Award Announced
Natalie Rothstein (21st June 1930 -18th February 2010)
was a much admired museum curator and textile scholar.
She became the leading international authority on
Spitalfields silks and was an outstanding curator at the
V & A Museum where she worked in various posts from
1952-1990. As well as her curatorial work, Natalie
enjoyed mentoring younger staff and was always concerned
that research into textiles should continue. Her
specialist field of study was the English silk industry
from 1600-1850. Silk Designs of the Eighteenth Century in
the Collection of the Victorian and Albert Museum (1990)
was her masterpiece and is an invaluable work of
reference.
The Natalie Rothstein Award
The award will be given for a piece of critical writing,
which reflects new research. The sum of £1,000 will be
awarded for an essay which should be no more that 5,000
words in length, on a subject of any type, which
represents a continuity of Natalie's research interests
and philosophies. This includes a wide range of topics,
for example: textile techniques, business ethics,
botanical drawing, the business of being a designer, the
curatorial role, the 18th century, the Huguenots and
silk. We would also welcome essays that demonstrate
knowledge of the significance of textile archives.
Scholars whose topics embrace the subject of silk are
also invited to submit a paper for the symposium outlined
below.
The deadline is 31st January 2013 and the award will be
announced at the Silk Symposium in spring 2013.
Silk Symposium Call For Papers
The symposium, on the theme of silk, will take place in a
central London location in spring 2013.
The winner of the Natalie Rothstein Award will be
announced then. The event will be entirely free to all
participants and attendees and we do welcome students to
this event.
Through the Natalie Rothstein Silk Symposium we wish to
encourage scholarship and the dissemination of new
research. We therefore invite papers that consider silk
in any context.
The Natalie Rothstein Silk Prize was
a one-off prize given in memory of the museum curator who
died in 2010. The prize was funded by her surviving
family
Dr Ben Marsh, of Stirling University, was awarded
£1000 for his paper ‘One man might bring it to
perfection’; Rev Ezra Stiles and the Quest for New
England Silk.
The Textile Society chose to add a commendation
award to Mei Mei Rado, a doctoral student at
Bard Graduate Center, New York, for her paper ‘Encountering
Magnificence: European Silks in the Qing Court during the
eighteenth century’.
Ben’s paper is part of his wider project exploring
largely failed attempts to grow silk throughout the
Atlantic world and ’s paper is part of his wider
project exploring especially in the Americas between
c.1500 and 1840. He is interested in the intersections
between political economy, utopianism, textile and
commodity history, migration, material culture, and
environment, and is working towards a second book that
brings to light many of these trials.
Silk Symposium, Fri 15th March 2013
Wellcome Collection
Euston Road, London
Programme
Clare Browne: A master weaver shows his
face: suggesting a possible identity for an eighteenth
century portrait
Joan Kendall: A bizarre design: silk
damask supplied to the Fifth Earl of Salisbury
(1691-1728)
Kay Staniland: ‘Fair Ladies here's
your Man', or Barbara Johnson revisited, 1755-1762
Deborah Dean & Tristram Aver: ‘Living
in Silk’: the people and politics of an exhibition
Mei Mei Rado: Encountering magnificence:
European silks in the Qing Court during the eighteenth
century
Dr Ben Marsh: ‘One man might bring
it to perfection’: Rev. Ezra Stiles and the quest
for New England silk
Drs Mary Brooks and Sonia O’Connor: Understanding
silk through X-radiography
Martin Ciszuk: Swedish eighteenth
century silk weaving: technology and market
Julia Gazères: Relaunching silk
production in Europe: the NOWSILK project
The silk symposium was to mark a bequest from Natalie
Rothstein whose work on eighteenth century silk is so
well known and revered. The day was in her memory. Mary
Schoeser and Brenda King explained how papers presented
had been chosen from many entries and, as the day
progressed, it was evident how Natalie Rothstein’s
influence and scholarship had played such an important
part in the ensuing research.
Many of the speakers had known her well and had been
colleagues, and it was fitting that Clare Browne’s
paper should open proceedings. She gave a detailed study
of a portrait at the V&A - attributed to Michael Dahl
- showing evidence of silk possibly relating to the
London textile trades in the eighteenth century. Many had
consulted Natalie Rothstein for her expert knowledge, as
Joan Kendall expounded, during her investigations of the
silk damask curtains at Hatfield House, illustrating both
the original and re-woven design, and the bed
furnishings. Still others had benefited from her
formidable legacy of published texts such as Barbara
Johnson’s Album of Fashions and Fabrics which
Natalie Rothstein had so famously rescued and ultimately
edited in its facsimile edition. Kay Staniland looked at
the album from a new angle, studying the engravings used
as frontispieces for the early pocket books depicted
alongside the dress samples.
|