Emilie Jehng

bfa textiles '16 @ risd maharam steam fellow currently in the Philippines.

[emiliejehng]

We’ve yet to begin plans for our talk at the Met Manila… But check out our flier!

Only 4 more days until we must leave the co-op, and travel back to Manila

[emiliejehng]

Days to the loom begin at 8am with a ten minute boat ride from Haiyaan to Pandan. From Pandan it is a twenty minute walk to the main road, where we will take a 10 minute tricycle ride to the co-op in Tubigon. From there, we take a small trip to the main market in Tubigon to buy lunch for the day.

These last few days we’ve been foraging for natural dye supplies. For sappan heartwood, aka sibukow (which will dye red or purple), we took a ten minute hike up the mountain behind the co-op to source. We've begun natural dye demos for the co-op's dyers, and weaving sample swatches with monofilament and our naturally-dyed raffia.

Our day ends around 5pm when we travel back to Pandan port. We wade in low tide water to where the water in deep enough for the boat to be docked, and hope we don't step on any starfish along the way; full immersion into the fisherman lifestyle.

[emiliejehng]

Some delayed photos from our first week at the Tubigon Loomweavers Multi-Purpose Cooperative aka TLMPC. 

This week was spent getting our bearings at the co-op. We arrived at the co-op knowing two things, 

1. We wanted to work with monofilament. Though not a natural fiber, monofilament (nylon fishing line) is something that is readily available in the fishing town of Tubigon. Using the fishing line as the warp (vertical threads on the loom), and raffia as the weft (horizontal threads) would, we thought, be a nice metaphor of the history of why the co-op was established* and a visual reminder of how the two may work in cohesion. Nice, right? 

 (*the co-op was established in 1993 to provide the wives of fishermen a steady source of work and income. The women began weaving when waiting for their husbands to return from fishing. This source of income became increasingly important as the fish in the sea depleted due to harmful fishing practices which destroyed coral reefs in the 2012 earthquake. The fishermen began building looms for their wives to weave on. More and more had to resign their jobs fishing and find other forms of livelihood.)

2. We would be working on their four-harness looms 

 After arriving at the co-op however, we came across two small set backs:

 1. The “readily available” monofilament in town came in packaged skeins, and would have to be wound onto cones in order to create the warp. This fact became increasingly alarming when we realized the co-op did not have a cone-winder; we would be winding all of the thread by hand into the cones.

 2. The promised four harness looms were five looms, three working, two broken, which had been neglected and unused since the installation. Few knew how to set one up, and none knew how to use them. They were used to two harness looms here.

 But if there’s a problem, there’s a solution: 

 1. We would enlist a small army of strong-willed and strong-wristed weavers to help us unwind our monofilament onto cones. We didn’t have cones, so nearby carpenters whipped some up for us by chiseling at some bamboo.   We began the unwinding process with three teams of two. One would hold the loop of thread while the other furiously twirled their arms winding the nylon onto the bamboo. In the course of an afternoon we had a grand total of….. 3 fully wound cones. We needed 10 by tomorrow. This method would not work. 

Traveling back to Haiyaan with 7 empty cones and 35 loops of monofilament to be wound, we approached ex-fishermen of the island. The fishermen helped us devise a system of unwinding the loops that required a chair, a beam, and only one person per cone. With our island army of 7, good music, and good attitude, we successfully wound 7 cones. 

 2. Next came the issue of dressing the looms no one knew how to work. No one person knew the entire process; this would have to be a collaborative scavenger hunt for know-how. Ruth, a 55 year old weaver showed us how to wind our warp on the warping board, Carmel, her 16 year old daughter, showed us how to wind the warps onto the looms, and we threaded and reeded the looms. 

 Our first week ended with three looms fully threaded with monofilament, and very sore arms

[emiliejehng]

Hello! We are currently hard at work on Bohol working with the Tubigon Loomweavers Multipurpose Co-Op, but island internet is making posting difficult. SO... I'll be updating with photos and more text once back in Manila (Aug 12). Since here we have, -hand-wound 10 cones of monofilament onto handmade bamboo cones enlisting the help of 5 ex-fishermen and 2 contractors, -invented a contraption with one pole, one clothing rack, wire, and twine to unwind said cones to warp, -dressed, threaded, and reeded(?), three four-harness looms, -had threading hooks made by a local metalsmith for 50 Philippine pesos (~$1), -began dyeing 2 kilos of raffia, -designed and set up TLMC's booth at the Sandugo Trade Expo, -learned the importance of free candy and booths, -met with Kenneth Cobonpue in Cebu, toured the Cobonpue residence and factory spaces, -started designing our book, -drank multiple cups hot chocolate We've only been on the island a week and a half, but we have a good feeling about this

[emiliejehng]

collection of dye stains

[emiliejehng]

The process of extracting dye from talisay leaves is a lot like brewing tea

step one: chop leaves (twice!) step two: submerge leaves in water  step three: bring to boil, remove from heat, let ferment overnight step four: after 24hr, reheat the leaf/water combo, let boil for 1-2 hrs step five: remove leaves, from dye extract step six: dye dye dye - talisay can dye shades of yellow, grey, and black

further thoughts: boiled talisay smells chinese-apothecary-collard-greens-black-tea

[emiliejehng]

For more effective dyeing, we must first scour (clean) and bleach (whiten) the fibers (abaca and raffia).

(@ PTRI)  

[emiliejehng]

Foraging pt II:

Gathering bunga de china nuts by 1.skillfully knocking the nuts out of the tree with 2.nearby branches, coconuts, and rocks to 3.lay out in the sun to dry

[emiliejehng]

Foraging pt I:

PTRI’s “Gampol: Volume 2″ in hand, we set off to collect talisay leaves and flame tree bark - two dye plants which grow in abundance here

[emiliejehng]

Home experiments with dye extraction from mangosteen husk and kamoteng dilaw (yam). These ‘home experiments’ have basically consisted of lyza and I putting the ingredients in a large pot with water, letting it reduce, then straining the pulp with cheese cloth to obtain the dye extracts - a complex extraction recipe derived from “Katutubong Kula”...

An excerpt from Katutubong: 

So far the colors achieved through this extraction method with fibers mordanted with alum are subtle, but we hope to achieve a deeper color with copper sulfate as the mordant, as well as more precise recipes and guidance from PTRI. 

[emiliejehng]

Today was spent at the Philippine Textile Research Institute (aka PTRI)

They gave us a quick tour in which they showed us their powder machine (able to turn dye extract -> powdered dye), successes dyeing with indigo and coffee husks, redesign sablay (Filipino graduation sash) project, and screen printing tests with natural dye pastes. 

We’re excited to come back in a few days to work with Rudy and Lucy in PTRI’s dye lab ~

[emiliejehng]

We made our way to Divisoria a few days ago in the hopes of finding our materials to dye, our materials to dye with, and our materials to extract dye from. 

While the market was an exciting mix of colorful fabrics, mismatched clothing, and large stacks of food... perhaps most exciting were the homemade parking signs. 

Though each sign serves the same purpose of reserving a parking space, each one had its own character and endearing quality. Rest assured there will be more photos of signs to come.

(mosquito bite count: growing)

[emiliejehng]

These past few days have been spent...

-Journeying back to Laguna to discuss plans for our 4 day natural dye workshop with Nina and Patis Tesoro

-Spending quality time in the hospital ER waiting room

-Nursing two abandoned neo-natal kittens

[emiliejehng]

A few days ago we traveled to Laguna, a town two hours south of Manila, to visit the house of a local ceramicist. After climbing many flights of stairs, we arrived at their wood-fire kiln, where pieces were in firing process. At the top right of the kiln we noticed a banana, mango, and some other artifacts. The artist explained that these were offerings to the kiln gods (one from the earth, sky, and water), in the hopes of a successful firing.

We’ll be traveling back to Laguna to speak with Nina Tesoro regarding the natural dye demos with her and her mother, Patis Tesoro, + a visit to the indigenous tribe of Abra, in the weeks to come.

(Mosquito bite count: 10)

[emiliejehng]

Hello! It is currently 86 degrees (“feels like 99 degrees”), 79% humidity, and a 90% chance of rain... which could only mean that Lyza and I have arrived in the Philippines for our 9-week long residency with the ~Office of Culture and Design ( aka OCD) and Class Act~, under the RISD Maharam STEAM Fellowship

During these 9 weeks we will...

-spend our time in Manila and Bohol, 

work with Nina and Patis Tesoro in Manila to research/explore the potential for natural dyes,

visit local tribal villages as well as speak with designers hoping to revive local cottage industries,

collaborate with the Tubigon Loomweavers Multi-Purpose Cooperative on Bohol to explore these practices in application,

attend FITE; the Festival International des Textiles Extraordinaires,

keep our plans flexible to adaptation/adjustment,

conclude our residency with a lecture presentation at the Met - Manila,

share our journeys via this blog, lyza’s blog, risd maharam fellows wordpress, and instagram (@ejehng, @lyzabaum), to the best of our non-4g LTE, limited wifi internet capabilities.