Doublethink: Polish Carpets in Transcultural Contexts

This paper examines the group of carpets termed tapis polonais (French for ‘Polish carpets’), which were mistakenly given this name in the nineteenth century despite their Persian provenience. Today, these artifacts are often described as ‘so-called Polish carpets’, emphasizing the historical confusion which led to coining the term. Bringing evidence from both early modern and modern archival and literary sources, this paper argues, however, that to fully understand the significance of tapis polonais, we must embrace their transcultural contexts. Although woven on Persian looms, they were often commissioned by Poles, Ruthenians, and Lithuanians, and until the late nineteenth century had been retained in eastern Europe. Various carpets based on similar designs were even produced in Poland-Lithuania, further complicating the discussion of these objects’ epistemic status. Tapis polonais effectively challenges outdated assumptions that the origin of an art form could be linked to a single nation or geographic place. They engender a more horizontal narrative, which treats with an equal concern all the various places where the tapis polonais were interpreted and re-employed. Stressing the transformation and reappropriation of artistic objects, this paper accordingly foregrounds the ongoing creation (and re-creation) of cultural forms that cannot be simply assigned to a single cultural region and its historical traditions.

Bio
Tomasz Grusiecki is Assistant Professor of Art History at Boise State University. He specializes in the study of visual and material culture in Poland-Lithuania, 1500-1700, focusing on early modern nationalism, cultural entanglement, and perceptions of selfhood and alterity. He has recently completed his first book, Transcultural Things and the Spectre of Orientalism in Early Modern Poland-Lithuania, and is currently awaiting the publisher's decision.

Co-sponsored by MaRS