DESIGN AND COLOR IN ANCIENT FABRICS 



431 



plished, that American designs taken 

 from the Museum will be extensively 

 used this season, and it may also be 

 said that the tendency among designers 

 to create fabrics from the art of the 

 New World and to give the public a 

 thorough knowledge of the aesthetic 

 value of this art, may not be far distant. 

 Our designers have formerly relied 

 almost exclusively upon suggestions from 

 foreign sources. They had not learned 

 the value of museum research, nor had 

 they formed the least idea of how ex- 

 tensive the local collections are. Of 

 course, the lack of this interest has pre- 



vented our collections from being devel- 

 oped with commercial problems in view. 

 The material here has been gathered 

 with a general view to art and science, 

 and has not been arranged for any 

 specific class of artists. Perhaps when 

 the great mills for wearing apparel have 

 successfully created fabrics from these 

 things, the next move will be to reach 

 the makers of upholstery and draperies — 

 and, in short, the workers in the entire 

 field of decorative art, that their energies 

 also may be directed to the material 

 contained in the American Museum of 

 Natural Historv. 



Note by the Editor. — For those readers of the 

 Journal who have access to the back files and are 

 particularly interested in possible ancient sources of 

 modern design, attention is called to the following 

 articles and their illustrations: 



Navajo Blankets, pp. 201-211, November, 1910; The 

 Fish Design on Peruvian Mummy Cloths, pp. 251-254, 

 December, 1910; Ancient Chinese Bronzes, pp. 59-65, 



February, 1911; Bagobo Fine Art Collection, pp. 164-171, 

 May, 1911; The Making of Pottery at San Ildefonso, pp. 

 192-196, October, 1911: Saltillo and Chimayo Blankets, 

 pp. 32-34, January, 1912: Ancient Pottery from Nazca, 

 Peru, pp. 207-208, May, 1914; and in issues of the given 

 year. Decorative Value of American Indian Art, pp. 301- 

 307, May, 1916; The Loom in the New World, and 

 Ancient Peruvian Cloths, pp. 381-393, October, 1916 



A choice Philippine woven fabric (Bagobo), in which the design is the result of tying the hemp fiber 

 before it is dyed 



