A Khevsureti man’s tunic (mid-20th century; TRC 2022.1090)Among the many items that arrived from Arizona earlier this year there are a number of garments from the Caucasian republic of Georgia. I must admit I knew very little about this ancient country and I am having an interesting time learning more and more in order to put the textiles into context.
Earlier this year, Erica Prus already wrote a blog about the fascinating Svaneti hats from Georgia which were acquired by the TRC some years ago.
The garments now added to the TRC collection include men’s tunics (including TRC 2022.1089 and TRC 2022.1090) and women’s dresses and jackets (including TRC 2022.1088 and TRC 2022.1091), from the isolated region of Khevsureti, in the northeast of Georgia.
A Khevsureti man’s tunic (mid-20th century; TRC 2022.1089)The region includes various small villages including Ertso-Tjaneti, Khevi and Kakheti. It is the latter that is particularly known for its embroidered garments. The Khevsureti clothes were traditionally made from locally spun and woven woollen cloth called toil, which is usually a dark brown or black in colour.
One of the embroidered items (TRC 2022.1088) is a man’s tunic called a chokha that is decorated with a large panel on the front with a side-opening. The designs are geometric in shape, and predominantly dark red in colour.
On the shoulders, back, sleeves and hems there are lines of appliqué, again in a series of geometric shapes based on squares and triangles.
A Khevsureti woman’s dress (mid-20th century, TRC 2022.1091).
Also among the Arizona collection are several women’s garments from Khevsureti. A complete outfit is known as a talavari and is made up of a headdress, dress (sadiatso) and jacket.
According to one account the front opening was meant to be kept fastened until childbirth, then it could be opened in order to breast feed.
During a period of mourning the garment was turned inside out so that the embroidery and applied decoration was no longer visible.
The main embroidery is around the neck opening, sleeve cuffs and near the hem. The hem border is made up of strips of coloured cloth (including black, red, dark red and green) that are sewn together. The embroidery includes cross stitch, surface couching and a form of diagonal couching.
Detail of Khevsureti woman’s dress (mid-20th century, TRC 2022.1091)The jacket worn with such garments is decorated on the front and back with applied blocks of white and red cloth, while the back is further decorated with a large panel of appliqué and embroidery (including cross stitch, zig-zag stitch, and surface couching).
All of the Georgian women's garments in the TRC collection are furthermore decorated with Soviet-period coins.
We are now working on some embroidery charts based on the various cross stitch panels mentioned in this blog. We would also love to have more textiles and garments from Georgia, to complement the small collecton we now have and to make this intriguing embroidery tradition more well-known.
Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood, 14 May 2022
Detail of a Khevsureti woman’s jacket (mid-20th century, TRC 2022.1088)
