The Diamond Receptacle

Intermediary between folk and fine art

Ethiopian fine art history consists entirely of religious art. Any non-religious art is the result of very recent modern-day art training and art schools.
But, there is an equally strong folk art history of textiles. I think, at its peak, textile/folk art reached the level of art. This is especially visible in the embroidery of dresses and shawls.
The word for embroidery is "tilet". For art it is "tibeb" – Fine Art being "Sine Tibeb". These borders go both by "tilet" and "tibeb". Somehow, the designers have found a term that would describe these borders both as a folk art (tilet) and as an intermediary between folk and fine art (tibeb). This is a clever nomenclature. I think English terminology could make more use of this.
Now for the embroidery. As Albers found through intense and life-long experimentation, these borders did indeed find a receptacle for art to permeate into the wider society. The primary shape that contained these colors is the diamond, rather then Albers' square.
Here is the example of the border. I will try to analyze it briefly.



First -

There are four diamond shaped colors as part of the overall theme: purple, yellow, red and green.
The first and second rows are the same colors, but flipped. Purple is substituted for yellow, red for green.
These two rows are then repeated for the rest of the design.


In color terms, purple and yellow are opposites, red and green are opposites. So at the very initial design stage in choosing the colors, the designer made a clear aesthetic decision.



Second –
Vertically, the colors have been juxtaposed with their opposing partner – purple with yellow, red with green.



But, to make the design more interesting, each vertical combination was flipped, and joined in rows. Purple-yellow-red-green links with Yellow-purple-green-red.





As complicated as even these four color combinations manage to be, it is in the initial step, where the individual colors were chosen and placed, where this more complicated design becomes possible.

Third –
The eye starts to pick up pockets of color where the diamonds have joined making larger diamonds.




So there is a horizontal, vertical and shape-influenced reading of the design.

Fourth –
The perennial cross shape is clearly decipherable within the design.





Fifth -
How do the viewers/wearers interact with this "tibeb"?
Well, as mentioned above, they pick up on the various shapes and juxtapositions – vertical and horizontal lines, and diamond and cross shapes.
Also, the shawls are not worn in one position. Draping the cloth and the embroidery across the shoulders and around the back allows for the embroidery to be viewed straight across, at an angle, and moving with the person’s body.
Thus it would seem that the shapes, colors and lines are always fluctuating.
So this diamond shape seen at one angle can look quite different at other angles.



Most importantly, the colors which are doing all this enunciation of shape line and direction also play a separate and independent part.
Yellow is pulled brightly forward, green is more subdued and stays in the background, red is less forceful than yellow, and purple isn't as passive as green.



Albers' idea of interacting the "viewer" with the art has gone a step further with this embroidered shawl.
Since the piece is not static, motion, direction of wear, even body size and shape, will all influence the viewer. The initial color choices, with their clever use of color dynamics and juxtapositions act as the important base for the work. The rest is completed by the human body and the human eye.
I wonder what Albers would have made of this subtle work of art?

Folk and Fine Art

Albers as choice leader

Color as a predominant element in most folk art. The irony is that what is considered the most sophisticated of the arts - the Fine Arts - started to adopt that idea in the 20th century.

Albers, for all his pedagogy and experimentation, is really a Fine (and fine) artist.

But, Albert was always trying to externalize his work and relate it directly to his viewers/audience/the community at large, and keep it within the outside world.

This is not entirely Albers’ conception – all art is really about trying to connect to the outside world some inner realm (usually spiritual). But I think Albers put it to another level, where he tries to make the audience do more of the imaginative work.

A pieta by a renaissance artist already has the story complete in the painting. The audience is expected to appreciate a new rendition of an ancient theme, but his vision is locked in the vision of the artist.

I think Albers tried unlock this method. His strategy was to leave representation out of his art, and instead find a receptacle from which he could unleash his audience’s imagination.

The square worked wonderfully because all people could concentrate on was the colors, and their interactions. And each individual can “fill in the gaps”. Red and green does what? Blue surrounded by yellow evokes what? Each person can fill in his own experience. Each person can make art, in a way.

Now, I don’t really think this is the best way to go for Fine Art, since the onus for the masterpiece is on the artists, and a common viewer can never achieve that level of perfection. But for 20th century artists, in their communal viewpoint, it was crucial to their art.

So, what of folk art and Albers? Well the purpose of folk art is really to involve rhe whole community. Everyone gets to dance, everyone gets to wear the clothes, everyone gets to paint the house.

Everyone participates. With a few choice leaders, of course. Which is the role that Albers has been trying to take all his life.

Still, for all his attempt at popularity, Albers remains in the tradition of the Fine Artists whose work is influenced by their more mundane.

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Color within Form

Study of Josef Albers' Design Strategy 

Josef Albers used his “Homage to the Square” series to try to contain color in form, but to keep color the center of attention.

A tree painted in saturated and vibrant colors will still be a painting of a tree, irrespective of the strength and force of the colors. Thus, form takes precedence over color.

Albers managed to side-step this difficulty of form almost always overriding color by making the most basic of forms, the square, the container of color.

There is no pronounced visual, psychological, cultural, contextual meaning attached to the square. It is just a square.

Thus, Albers put his juxtaposition of colors in this square (or nested squares) to get us to concentrate on color instead.

No randomness, no abstraction and no alien shapes and elements. A simple form of a square saturated with color.

But, what was his intention?

His response, as all artists will have a reason as to why they do things, is that he wanted people to interact with these colors in their own time, and in their own way.

How does an outer dark blue square interact with a nested bright green one? How about the an outer-most square of a brighter blue and its relationship with both these nested squares?


Study for Homage to the Square: Beaming 1963

[The squares] move forth and back, in and out, and grow up and down and near and far, as well as enlarged and diminished. All this, to proclaim color autonomy as a means of plastic organization.'
Josef Albers


Homage to the Square: MMA-2, 1970

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Visual Experience

In NYC


Josef Albers, Hommage to the Square, 1963

I took advantage of my recent trip into New York City to upgrade my visual vocabulary, or at least my visual experience.

Besides realizing the greatness of New York architecture, there was a lot to see.

The Metropolitan had the Weimar Republic German artists do their rendition of that decaying society. But, one can see their supreme (for lack of a better word) talent when viewing their drawings. I believe it is the drawing that makes the artist, and these ones are no exception.

Since the theme was German (well, I also got to see the Tiffany estate collection, the American Painters in Paris and Sean Scully’s Wall of Light - more of a patchwork colorist - I went to the nearby Whitney to see the exhibition on the Bauhaus designers Josef Albers and Moholy-Nagy. These were the artists that were eventually kicked out of Germany by the Nazis.

Albers experimented with color extensively. His deceptively simple squares are really an attempt to put color, and our interactions with color, to the forefront.

I think he succeeded both experimentally and in a small, genius sort of way, artistically.

I am working on another blog entry called “Albers and the Abyssinians”. Another charming genius creation, which I’m sure Albers would have appreciated.

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