Bashir Torba

This Central Asian tent bag was most likely woven in the Middle Amu Darya area of what is now Uzbekistan. Structurally, it uses white cotton, hand-spun weft with the typical hardy dark wool warp of the region. The soft wool pile is asymmetrically knotted and seemingly open to the left. Design wise, the piece demonstrates the influence of Central Asian textiles, particularly silk ikats, on pile rug design. The elongated field draws motifs frequently seen in these textiles while the shift in ground color from red to blue and from blue to natural brown in the border mimics ikat technique.