The Down Jersey Folklife Center at WheatonArts presents,
in collaboration with RCINY

WEAVING CULTURAL HERITAGE. ROMANIAN RUGS FROM OLTENIA, MARAMURES AND MOLDAVIA REGIONS


This is an exhibition of Romanian hand-woven rugs from the private collection of Margaret Mukherjee. Margaret has worked with weavers who represent three different regional traditions of Romania (Oltenia, Moldavia and Maramures) and three different generations, striving to preserve and pass on this important form of the Romanian folk culture. Their works now tell us the story of the Romanian weaving traditions.

"Margaret Mukherjee does not speak Romanian but she found another way to communicate with the villagers of Romania: the look. Together they looked at rugs and recently woven carpets; together they compared images preserved in albums with the contemporary patterns hand-made by craftswomen; and together they shared the stories and meanings the carpets expressed.

It is a sign that Romanian carpets, and not just those sheltered in museums, are taken seriously, not only by the locals who grew up with them but by outsiders, too. In ancient Romania, hospitality, the obligation of sharing food and shelter with a stranger in need, humanized him, turning the stranger into 'one of ours.'

In the case of Margaret Mukherjee and the women of Romanian villages, she became 'one of theirs' in front of the loom, as women invited her to unravel the stories told in the rug’s woven threads." - Ioana Popescu, Director of Research at the Museum of the Romanian Peasant in Bucharest

The exhibition is curated by Iveta Pirgova, Director of the Down Jersey Folklife Center at WheatonArts.

RCINY supported the publication of the exhibition brochure, which includes articles by Iveta Pirgova, Ioana Popescu, and Lila Passima, researcher at the Museum of the Romanian Peasant in Bucharest. Read the full version of their articles at the links to the right.

Below: a gallery of details and motifs from the rugs in the exhibition. Details on their symbolism will be available here soon.