Well,
this exhibition came about because we received a gift that was in
family ownership since over 100 years and because of another exhibition
about textiles in our museum, they thought it would be a great idea
to donate it to the museum. We've had a look at it and soon
realized, that this will be an interesting topic, because it would be possible to
show the exchange between East and West in the second half of the
19th century, as Europe saw it back then –
and that's because of Emil Alpiger, who was working for a carpet company back then
and collected the items – and how that was received in Persia, and how
Persia responded to this European influence.
That's basically the main point. It's also about showing what hybridization
means. What we present here is a kind of style mix, something that's
usually something that art history is not very popular to look at, because it's not
something that you would normally expect, but here we have wonderful examples for
exactly this exchange between East and West.
Yes, Alpiger was an interesting character. He worked for Ziegler & Company
for 20 years, in Persia, he set up the whole carpet manufactory
there, but that's only his quiet civic life. Before that he was very
adventurous. Ten years of his life –
we had to reconstruct this, because we don't have all his records – he obviously
worked for the Bergamask silk industry, he also smuggled for them,
for example he tried to bring silkworm eggs
from Iran to Europe. That was necessary, because there was a huge epidemic that
threatened and destroyed the silk cultures in Europe. And the only
way to solve this problem was to
bring silkworm eggs, from Persia in the beginning, which he did,
and then from Japan, because one had to go more and more to the East since
the epidemic spread. And in Japan, Alpiger even caused the first
world trade conflict. Japan had just opened up itself, there were
the first contacts with Europe, and
Alpiger probably lost his patience while negotiating with a Japanese
businessman whom he threatened. This incident led to a trial that the
then Consul, the Swiss Consul, led, and he punished Alpiger.
That was considered very important internationally at that time, because
it meant, great, here not only Europeans are always proved right, but in this
case the Japanese, who were usually seen as the victims or those who
one can exploit. This trial put them
on the same level and that had a huge effect on the Swiss in Japan itself
but It was also recognized internationally very benevolently. And Alpiger then
did other things, he lived in Paris for a while, tried to start his
own business, which failed, he started a first family, but shortly after
the birth of his first son, his wife
and his son died. He then started a second family und with his second
family he emigrated to Persia. The family
was in Persia obviously, but also lived some time here in Zürich
and finally moved to Zürich in 1896.
Yes, there has even been globalization before, I think there has been a tendency,
even since ancient times, to seek for worldwide relations. It was simply
an exciting time, in the 19th century. First of all because there was the
industrialization in Europe itself, that means there were problems
in the factories, in the production, there was a rush to money, making
money was the big thing, and there
was this industrial capitalism, and there was of course this worldwide politics,
let's think of England or the other colonial powers, where one tried to
bring in goods. Everything got easier,
that means distances suddenly became more conquerable, this can be seen
very clearly from Alpiger's notes, where he for example was enthusiastic
that he could ride on the first trains. Suddenly he was able to travel all around
the world within a few weeks, today that seems a long time, but back then
it wasn't months anymore, but weeks, and that of course was the big change.
Equally there was this perspective
to trade with others, preferably
for your own benefit, so everything that we still weep over today, was there
in its early days back then, and when we compare the today with those days, we
realize that it was still in its infancy and human, compared to what we are seeing
in part today.
Yes, we have a beautiful example where you see a man's tunic that has a cuff,
in former times, or in Persia, you
had the outer fabrics, and on the inside was always lined with a border, which
was very beautiful and in most cases in a different pattern. And we have
a beautiful example here, where you can see: there's the cuff, made of
one of the highest quality wool fabric that were produced in Persia itself,
which was already quite old back then, because they were economizing on resources,
and this fabric pattern was then copied in Manchester probably,
as industrially produced printing fabric.
And we have here another man's tunic, which was produced from exactly this classy,
wonderful – in this case surrogate – fabric.
And here you see perfectly that there was a transformation that could be
realized industrially, but which then nevertheless was accepted and used
in Persia. This is one of the great examples, and then there are the
Ziegler-carpets, where you can see that a Persian carpet that has a
very complex, very sophisticated pattern
was simplified, certain parts were taken out, cleaned so to say, and
in this simplified form it was then popular in Europe to lay out such
carpets in the salon.
One might have to say that the Persian society has a great talent to
adopt things very quickly and make it their own. In this case we
interestingly have a letter from Mrs Alpiger, who in the beginning
accompanied her husband, 1874/1875 in Iran, we assume, there we also find notes
from him, where he describes how he had to rides through the wastelands,
with the horse, 8 to 9 hours in the saddle,
mostly during the night, because it wasn't that hot anymore.
20 years later, she writes - it's her last visit to Iran – about how great
the journey was, they were traveling in a hackney cab, there was also already
a train leaving from Teheran, there was telegraphy. So within 20 years
a total change has taken place in Persian society, supported by
the Shah himself, of course, but what's interesting then is that this change
continues, there's a huge modernization boost in the 1920s, the 50s and 60s are
fantastic, there are things
that would be the Dernier Cri
in Europe as well, and so this society transforms itself very fast.
So if you are looking for the latest fashion from Milan, go to a party in
Teheran, you will most definitely find it there.
We were working on the exhibition pretty much exactly a year.
I have to add that I know textiles already, so in this case I didn't
have to start at the very beginning. But what we naturally tried to find out
is how did Alpiger live at all. On the one hand it wasn't that hard
to find out, because of his handwritten notes that I have
transcribed. It was more difficult
to retrace his different stages of life. It was only by chance that we found out
that he once lived in Paris, and my husband searched for his name in
the internet archives of the city of Paris, and that's how we figured out
that he had survived, that he had lived in Paris, that he
had a wife, a first wife and a son,
so with all these steps one thing lead to another. Another thing was
also to call the Swiss civil registry and ask for related data, and this is
really impressive, I have to say, that was really easy, you just
get an excerpt of it, saying that's the
data we have, and that of course
has helped us a lot in our research.
For more infomation >> Herzogin Kate und Camilla: Peinlicher Fashion-Fauxpas! - Duration: 5:44. 
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét