Illustration: Indian cotton print design, 19th century.
Indian textiles had long made an impact on British design and decoration and had been doing so with an increasingly larger and more dominant approach to the British market throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The British were impressed by the professional standard of textile work produced in India and particularly that of East Bengal, now present day Bangladesh. Imports were wide scaling and became hugely popular with the British public. This had produced by the nineteenth century a subtle dependency of the British industry on the style and format of Indian pattern work to such an extent that it seemed, at first glance, to be difficult to tell textiles that had been imported from India and those that had been produced domestically.
Illustration: Indian cotton print design, 19th century.
By the middle of the nineteenth century, a systematic analysis of Indian imports and design work in general was underway. Before this period the British textile industry had been largely content to merely copy Indian textile work in order to accrue their own profits from the popularity of the pattern work. However, with critics such as Owen Jones, Richard Redgrave and Henry Cole, the idea of examining Indian techniques both on a decorative, technical and practical level, became a legitimate subject for discussion.
The British Design Reform movement largely headed by Cole and Redgrave, called for a more manageable and practical approach to surface pattern. Their was an insistence that pattern work should be representative of and sympathetic to the discipline of textiles, in other words that flat pattern work should be twinned with the flat medium of textiles. This called into question contemporary ideas concerning the three dimensional trickery involved in so much European pattern work that was not only limited to printed textiles but included carpet, tapestry and embroidery work. That this could also be expanded into surface pattern work reproduced in the decorative format of ceramics, glass, metal, stone and wood, shows that European decoration during this period, had some serious and fundamental problems.
Illuatration: Indian cotton print design, 19th century.
The Design Reform movement was particularly interested in the concept of Indian textile work as it was standard throughout the Indian industry not to use any form of shadow, which by definition gave pattern work the illusion of dimension. Therefore, as far as Cole and others were concerned, Indian textile work was a perfect representation of an industry that was intrinsically aware of the limitations of a discipline such as textile design. It was strenuously hoped that the British industry would understand the decorative principles by which the Indian textile industry was founded and follow suit, opening up a new and more creatively productive phase of the British textile industry.
There was always opposition to the use of India as a template for the promotion of contemporary decoration and pattern work, but this was usually based on religious, racial or classically inspired opposition, rather than technical or practical considerations. Interestingly these opposition voices tended to be of a relatively small nature, but this could have much to do with the fact that Henry Cole himself was an important civil servant who had managed to accrue a huge area of influence during the third quarter of the nineteenth century. Cole had at least a partial influence over a number of important individuals from the Prince Regent to a number of ministers within different governments of the period. Therefore, his belief in Design Reform gained both influence and momentum largely due to his position, that he could include a need to study and understand Indian textile work within this remit, gave the movement its real strategy for reform.
Illustration: Indian cotton print design, 19th century.
Although Indian textile work was held by many in Britain to be infinitely superior to anything that could be produced at home, there still appeared sporadic interference in the daily practical aspects of the industry. East Bengal in particular seemed to bear the brunt of at least a potential for British interference. Many letters, articles and journals were produced over decades concerning new and different ways of increasing the potential of Indian textile work. Many of these were produced by government officials in Calcutta (Kolkata), the British long-term capital of India, which was also within easy reach of the large textile producing area around Dacca (Dhaka), the present day capital of Bangladesh. Nothing was ever said as to the standard of the decorative pattern work itself and perhaps this says much about the British attitude in India to the decorative arts. It was probably understood that Britain had little, if anything to add to the pattern work being produced in India, but felt that perhaps they could contribute towards the better systematic running, at least on an industrial scale, of the industry.
Illustration: Indian cotton print design, 19th century.
The power and influence of Indian textile pattern work on that of the British industry can be seen running through the entire course of the British connection with India, from it's initial trading links in the seventeenth century, through to its occupation as part of the Empire and through to independence in the mid-twentieth century and beyond. British designers have used different Indian pattern methods, usually though not universally, connected to floral inspired work, with chintz being particularly influential to such an extent that today chintz is considered as much British as it was originally Indian. The influence of Indian textile work on the British industry should never be underestimated. It has fundamentally challenged, guided and changed the concept of surface pattern in Britain throughout the last four centuries and will continue to do so indefinitely.
Interestingly, and perhaps ironically, the British textile industry today is only a shadow of its former self, while the Indian and more particularly Bangladeshi industry is now seen as a world leader, with textiles being by far the largest proportion of its exports. It has been able to consolidate the long and often complex history of textile design and pattern work in the region and therefore continues the cultural affinity with the production of textiles that it has always maintained.
Further reading links:
Islamic Decoration and Ornament as seen by Owen Jones
Indian Textiles
Chintz: Indian Textiles for the West
Threads & Voices: Behind the Indian Textile Tradition
Indian and Persian Textile Designs CD-ROM and Book (Dover Full-Color Electronic Design)
Traditional Indian Textiles
Decorative Design History in Indian Textiles and Costumes
Tradition and Beyond: Handcrafted Indian Textiles
Nomadic Embroideries: India's Tribal Textile Art
Sari to Sarong: Five Hundred Years of Indian and Indonesian Textile Exchange
Paisleys and Other Textile Designs from India (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)
Indian Saris: Traditions - Perspectives - Design
Sangrah : Ethnic Indian Textile Designs
Cotton (Textiles That Changed the World)
Textile Motifs of India (Agile Rabbit Editions)
Ralli Quilts: Traditional Textiles from Pakistan and India
Textile Arts of India
Indian Embroidery
