Why Bast Fiber? 

 My attempt of learning about Obi leads me into the search of bast fiber. Obi (帯) means  band/belt, was originated from Japan, the series of Obi in the TRC collection were woven in  the technique Sakiori(裂織), which uses recycled garment as weft materials; bast fiber or cotton  as warp material. The unfamiliar term “bast” interested me. Out of my curiosity of this term, I  began the learning learning of bast fibre.  

 Bast fiber has thousands years of history, rooted in different cultures. Asia in particular  has a profound history of the origin and fashioning of bast fiber. In my home country China,  bast products such as linen appears in everyday’s life. Today, China is also one of the biggest  producers of commercially woven hemp and ramie cloth.  

 In this project, I am going to explore the materiality of different kind of bast and  natural plant fibers. Start from collecting fibers in various forms and fashion as much as  possible in my ability. Learning about their textures, structures, touch, and colors as well as  their different manifestations in places and cultures. 

 I would like to share this quote from Milgram and Hamilton “When a weaver makes a  textile, she is an agent not only creating a work of art but also launching an endlessly  reverberating chain of social processes. If she chooses to weave a textile made from locally  produced bast or leaf fibers, or makes an item that she regards as a marker of her identity, or  wears the object within her own community—these actions launch different sets of processes  than would have occurred if she had used some-bought commercial yarn, or made a new sort of  objects, or carried it over the hill to market in a nearby town. In short, the weaver’s choices  matter. She lives surrounded by the results of her actions and responds to them in turn.  ” ( Milgram and Hamilton, 22) Personally, I use wool the most because its softness and good to 1 dye with. When I browse online to shop yarns for my weaving, the most occurring materials are  wool, cotton and synthetic yarns. In some way, these kind of yarns are more accessible and have  more color choices as well as nice compatibility. But as I learn more about the vast universe of  bast and natural fiber, the rich materiality of them as well as the cultural significance behind  them have so much more to say. 

What is Bast? 

Bast (phloem fibre/ skin fibre) fibre is a kind of cellulosic fiber. It is obtained from the “inner  bark”/ “skin” (Phloem) or bast (complex tissue layer located under bark) of dicotyledonous  plants, which the plant’s seed has two embryonic leaves or cotyledons. Taken from the  herbaceous stems of annuals or perennials or from persistent stems of woody plants. Bast fibre  structure includes sieve tubes, parenchyma cells and fiber cells. Bast is a very durable material,  good for providing strength. Common uses of bast are textiles, paper, rope, cordage, netting, to  name a few. 

Bast fibre examples:  

Hemp(Cannabis sativa)  

Kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus /Deccan hemp/Java jute) 

Jute (Corchorus spp.) 

Ramie (Boehmeria nivea)  

Wisteria(Wisteria)  

Kudzu (Pueraria montana /Japanese arrowroot/Chinese arrowroot)  

Nettle (Urtica)  

Gampi  

Kozo 

Mitsumata 

Paper Mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera) 

Linden (Tilia) 

Flax (Linum usitatissimum )  

Elm (Ulmus )  

Hibiscus  

Doyo leaf  

Leaf fiber (processed from monocotyledonous plants. Sometimes might be categorized as Bast) Banana(Musa )  

Abacá (Musa textilis ) 

Piña/ Pineapple  

Sisal (Agave sisalana) 

Henequen (Agave fourcroydes) 

Raffia 

More about Bast  

• The predominant figure in the manufacture of plant fiber is cotton, representing 98 percent of  the total natural plant fiber market for textiles. The large variety of bast and natural fibers 2 often get overlooked. The marginality of regions and the quest of speed and quantity of the  

market makes them hard to over compete with cotton and synthetic yarns. The production of  many bast/leaf fiber and their related products (such as paper, weavings…) requires manual  labor and a set of knowledge that rooted in the local culture. The history of bast fibers and  their “restoration”intertwined with the history of colonialism, globalization, and capitalism.  

• Bast fiber such as ramie in China, flax in Egypt is the earliest textile fiber used by mankind.  About 6,000 years ago, people used hemp to separate, tie, and grade the hemp into yarns,  twist them into ropes, and tie nets to knit clothes.3 

• Bast fiber products often labeled as green and “ethnic” product as the consumer culture  started to pursue a more eco-friendly lifestyle and support local businesses. This phenomenon  has two-folded effect, on one side it seems improved the economy especially in marginal  regions and highlighting their local culture. But at the same time it has a risk of exploiting  marginal culture through strategies of marketing. As the locals started to benefit from  tourism and life-style boutiques by producing bast products, the consumers also “demands” a  certain narrative of bast heritage.  

• When I was searching for mulberry paper online, I noticed that the shop website would  mention the place of production and the mode of production(highlighting handmade). Also  they are imported from East and South East Asia, such as in China, Japan, Korea, Thailand  and Philippines…some others are from South America, mostly Mexico and Peru. I also  noticed that there are more variety of products and resource of bast fiber when I looked into  Chinese shops and websites than shops in the U.S.. 

• The category of bast is still ambiguous and confusing to me. I’ve noticed an inconsistency of  categorizing bast fibre among different sources. From the book, there are three category of  plant fibers : seed, bast or leaf. Cotton for example is a seed fiber. There’s a difference 4 between a bast fibre and a leaf fibre. In that sense, fibers such as pineapple, sisal, henequen,  and fibers from the banana family( if the fibers are taken from leaf base) are technically not a  bast fibre. However some online sources categorized all of them into bast fibers. It might be  the case that some fibers can be taken from both the plant leaf and from the bark. 

I searched bast materials online to see what I am able to get hold of. I gathered together a small  collection of different processing stages of raw fibers, roving, ready-spun yarns and papers. I also  interacted with the materials, hand spun the raw fiber into yarns; wove the ready-spun yarns into small  weavings. I kept the papers as they are because they are beautiful.

1 Hamilton, Roy W., and B. Lynne Milgram. 2008. Material choices: refashioning bast and leaf fibers in Asia and the Pacific. Los  Angeles, Calif: UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History. p22

2 Hamilton, Roy W., and B. Lynne Milgram. 2008. Material choices: refashioning bast and leaf fibers in Asia and the Pacific. Los Angeles, Calif: UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History. p25 

3 中国⿇纺织发展史. China Hemp Textile Industry Association, 2018. http://www.cblfta.org.cn/cblftaorg/vip_doc/18058271.html. 

4 Hamilton, Roy W., and B. Lynne Milgram. 2008. Material choices: refashioning bast and leaf fibers in Asia and the Pacific. Los  Angeles, Calif: UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History. 

Pineapple fiber, also has a name Piña fiber derived from pineapple in Spanish piña. The fiber is obtained from the leaf of the pineapple plant (Ananas comosus). Pineapple was introduced to the Philippines during the Spanish colonial period. Piña fiber and piña textiles are closely related to this period of history of colonialism. 

Banana fiber is a leaf fiber technically, it is fund in the trunk of the banana tree rather than in the blades of the leaves. “This seeming contradiction has to do with the structure of the Banana plant, the “trunk” of which actually consists of a series of inter-nesting leaf bases.”(Hamilton, Roy W., and B. Lynne Milgram. 2008. Material choices: refashioning bast and leaf fibers in Asia and the Pacific. Los Angeles, Calif: UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History. p30)

Mulberry paper

Paper Mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera), a shrub or tree, Native to China, Japan, Korea, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Burma and Assam (India), but cultivated extensively elsewhere in Asia and the Pacific, and naturalized in parts of southern Europe and the USA.1

Kozo

The bast fiber from the inner bark of the paper mulberry tree is used in the manufacture of handmade oriental paper.2

Kozo is used as a general term for Japanese paper made from the inner bark of mulberry trees, such as the Mulberry paper (Broussonetia papyrifera) and bast paper fibers harvested from that plant. Kozo papers are often used for backing when Asian scrolls are relined. Kozo is an important paper fiber in traditional Japanese, Korean, and Chinese hand paper-making. The inner bark requires little chemical intervention to create high quality, long fibers that are low in lignin. The long fiber length and high percentage of Alpha cellulose impart strength to Kozo papers.3

Chiri

Chiri means leftovers in Japanese, it refers to the bits of the dark outer bark of the Kozo (mulberry) plant branches which are left in the vat during the paper making process.4

1 “Broussonetia Papyrifera (L.) L'Hér. Ex Vent.: Plants of the World Online: Kew Science.” Plants of the World Online. Accessed April 14, 2021. http://powo.science.kew.org/taxon/urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:850861-1.

2 “Mulberry Paper.” CAMEO. Museum of Fine Arts Boston, October 2020. http://cameo.mfa.org/wiki/Mulberry_paper. Accessed April 14 2021.

3 “Kozo.” CAMEO. Museum of Fine Arts Boston, October 29, 2020. [http://cameo.mfa.org/wiki/Kozo](http://cameo.mfa.org/wiki/ Kozo). Accessed April 14 2021.

4“Chiri Tissue 15cm 40 Sheets.” Paper Jade. Accessed April 14, 2021. https://www.paperjade.com/products/ori10350? variant=25504137611.

Details of the paired weft yarns (weft includes cotton, wool, and possibly some plant fiber

T'nalak

Accession Number: TRCO 4.08

Date: Late 20th Century

Object Dimensions: 46" x 25"

Material: Abacá fibers

Techniques: Weaving, Ikat, Dyeing

Place of Manufacture : Philippines

Bibliography

Hamilton, Roy W., and B. Lynne Milgram. 2008. Material choices: refashioning bast and leaf fibers in Asia and the Pacific. Los Angeles, Calif: UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History.

中国麻纺织发展史. China Hemp Textile Industry Association, 2018. http://www.cblfta.org.cn/cblftaorg/ vip_doc/18058271.html.

“Broussonetia Papyrifera (L.) L'Hér. Ex Vent.: Plants of the World Online: Kew Science.” Plants of the World Online. Accessed April 14, 2021. http://powo.science.kew.org/taxon/urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:850861-1. \

“Mulberry Paper.” CAMEO. Museum of Fine Arts Boston, October 2020. http://cameo.mfa.org/wiki/ Mulberry_paper. Accessed April 14 2021.

“Kozo.” CAMEO. Museum of Fine Arts Boston, October 29, 2020. [http://cameo.mfa.org/wiki/Kozo](http:// cameo.mfa.org/wiki/Kozo). Accessed April 14 2021.

“Chiri Tissue 15cm 40 Sheets.” Paper Jade. Accessed April 14, 2021. https://www.paperjade.com/products/ ori10350?variant=25504137611.

“Obi.” SAIC Digital Collections. SAIC. Accessed April 29, 2021. https://digitalcollections.saic.edu/islandora/ object/islandora%3Atrc_3265? solr_nav%5Bid%5D=26e94f0f56bbb4094831&solr_nav%5Bpage%5D=0&solr_nav%5Boffset%5D=1.

“T'nalak.” SAIC Digital Collections. SAIC. Accessed April 29, 2021. https://digitalcollections.saic.edu/islandora/ object/islandora%3Atrc_4064? solr_nav%5Bid%5D=5a8d5d29a0ae628f21a5&solr_nav%5Bpage%5D=1&solr_nav%5Boffset%5D=6.