Man's shoulder or hip cloth (hinggi), 1983.93

This striking and unusual textile differs significantly from the other examples of men's cloths (hinggi) in the Dallas Museum of Art collection. It is divided into seven horizontal bands, and its motifs and coloration produce a bold overall abstraction of aquatic life. Three larger bands are filled with designs that were identified by the weaver as rays "jumping or skipping over the surface of the water at sundown," while the four smaller bands depict "turtles breaking waves" and emerging from the surf to lay their eggs.[1] The ground is a deep indigo, the yarn having been dipped in the dye numerous times to produce a rich blue-black hue. The turtles, rays, waves, surf, and other more abstract forms appear to swim on a velvet blue sea in contrasting colors of rust, the natural off-white yarn, and light blue accents.

Aquatic animals such as lobsters, fish, octopuses, and shrimp occur with some regularity on hinggi, but rays (rumput laut) and turtles (tanoma) are rare. Symbolizing personal attributes such as wisdom, the latter are often carved on memorial stones (penji) and are associated with royalty. Hinggi motifs include designs that refer to social status, royal prerogatives, mythology, history, and religion, each of these being individual and discreet declarations of position and power. This example, however, could be interpreted as a highly abstract narrative, a story of the sea and man's relationship to this mysterious and religiously charmed realm, filled with creatures associated with the ancient ancestry of today's Sumbanese. Skirting the boundaries of traditional hinggi design and composition, this unique cloth was woven by a highly creative weaver who dared to push accepted artistic conventions. Hinggi design was never static, but rather always responsive to changing internal and external influences and circumstances as necessary.

While this striking cloth does not seem to have substantially influenced hinggi design and composition in the years immediately following its creation, its innovative configuration is echoed and magnified by narrative cloths first woven for tourists in the 1980s. These cloths are far more literal and realistic, but aspects of Sumbanese thought and history are embodied in both the Dallas cloth and these later ones. The Dallas cloth was intended for traditional use, but these later "hinggi" are directed to the tourist market and new purposes, uses, and patrons.

In contrast to the majority of hinggi in Western collections, this textile was acquired directly from the weaver, a Savunese woman married to an East Sumbanese nobleman (kabisu). It was woven at some time during World War I or slightly later. Savu lies midway between Sumba and Timor. Many Savunese migrated to East Sumba during the 19th century, and significant Savunese contacts presumably date to an even earlier period, along with a history of intermarriage between royal families on the two islands. 

[1] Personal communication between the author and Steven G. Alpert, 2012. 

George Ellis, "Man's shoulder or hip cloth (hinggi)" in Eyes of the Ancestors: The Arts of Island Southeast Asia at the Dallas Museum of Art, ed. Reimar Schefold in collaboration with Steven Alpert (Dallas: Dallas Museum of Art; New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2013), 232-233.

ASSOCIATED CONTENT CHUNKS (list applicable note links)

Island Southeast Asia  

VIDEO ASSETS  

Apply to objects where number equals 1983.93