Vintage Modernist Tribal Felt
This vintage modernist tribal felt weaves ancient and contemporary elements together. Mankind created felts as one of the first woolen structures. Archaeologists discovered some of the earliest examples in Central Asian ‘kurgans’, where craftsmen decorated them with various zoomorphic motifs typical of Siberian cultures. Turkic invaders brought the art of felt-making to Turkey, where specific tribal people in Anatolia developed it further. Nomadic tribes around Konya, in central Anatolia, used examples like this one in their ‘yurts’. Artisans made these felts from undyed wool, and the tribes used them to decorate the inner walls or roofs of their tents, resulting in a wide variety of formats. The design’s archaic quality might lead us to forget we’re looking at a utilitarian object, transporting us into the realm of contemporary abstract art.