It was a really lively session today. We were exploring the accidental
texture and surprises that occur with a different felting technique – nuno.
The word ‘nuno’ means cloth in Japanese. In this process you combine sheep
wool with a natural cloth such as muslin. During felting, the wool fibers migrate through the weave of the
cloth. When the wool fibers shrink, the other fabrics shrink with them.
The result is a wonderfully textured fabric that is lightweight.
In this process though – you are encouraged to throw your cloth on the
table for at least 5 minutes, which help shock and shrink the fibres. This
generated lots of discussion about different kinds of Indian bread, which you
throw the dough during preparation. Chapati, puri, roti, paratha, naan, dosa and many more.
A couple of the ladies from Sikh Elders group filled the room with
their singing for a good hour, as they embroidered into their felt. Their old
Punjabi songs took us on a journey through traditional wedding songs, moral
tales about annoying mother in laws, holidays without husbands and traditional female
daily life – often with a deeper meaning but mostly rather comical.
There was a particular song ‘Sui ve Sui’ comparing a mother in law to a
needle - if a needle pricks you, it hurts. The needle symbolises a woman’s pain
because she is hurt by the way her mother in law treats her.
I really enjoyed listening to the chuckles and giggles from the women
and have since listened to some of the songs online – which has been
fascinating to learn more about the meaning behind the songs. Turns out there
are quite a lot of Punjabi songs about mother in laws!
Bryony
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