The Colors of Tarogil Village, Pakistan - Textile Students

Some history first: The earliest known example of cotton is the fragment found at Mehrgarh, Pakistan, one of the most important Neolithic (Stone Age/7000 B.C. – 3200 B.C. ) sites.
(Source: Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 29, Issue 12, December 2002, Pages 1393-1401)

Today, cotton textile production and apparel manufacturing are Pakistan's largest industries, accounting for about 70% of total export.

Consequently, it is quite significant that Beaconhouse National University has nurtured a Textiles Department. During my 4th week in Pakistan, I conducted a color workshop for these students.

The workshop included a field trip to the village - a small cluster of homes in the midst of the mustard fields that surrounds the Tarogil campus. The homes are primarily constructed of mud, mud-brick, and thatch. Unpaved streets and paths are filled with people dressed in traditional garb, donkey carts and buffalo carts (whose prototype dates back to the third millennium B.C.). No cars! A sense of timelessness . . . a step back to a time that most of us only see in movies. The visual landscape of Targogil village reminds us of that era in Pakistan that is the source of the earliest cotton fragment.

The assignment required that the textile students note the colors in the village. As was the case with the 2nd year Visual Communications students, they were to get close to whatever they encountered – whether it were the colors of the mustard fields and other colors in the natural surround or the materials and surfaces of objects and structures.

After compiling their color notations, each student selected three favorite colors and one least favorite color for a composition based on the Bezold effect.

A series of illustrations is provided at this LINK