Thanks to the Textile Research Centre Leiden for this article about Surayia Rahman and her role in the revival of kantha in Bangladesh. Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood and Willem Vogelsang are experts and proponents of textiles from around the world and the knowledge that they assemble at #TRC-Leiden is impressive.
The iconic photo in the TRC article is by @Anil444Advani, a friend of Surayia and one of the earliest supporters of THREADS.
#Bangladesh #Nakshikantha #SurayiaRahman
Posted by: Len
The last few days have been hectic but very positive. Soon after an announcement went into the local newspaper about our talk at the Silver Cinema series, Cathy and I were contacted by a journalist asking if he could interview us about the film. We agreed, and he came by to talk with us on Monday the 18th. As he was going back to his office he mentioned that the article would appear in two day’s time, on the 20th. Sure enough, we found this article Wednesday morning. The print edition also included one of Anil Advani’s beautiful portraits of Surayia (see below). The electronic version of the article has already been shared multiple times by friends on Facebook. Thank you!
On the 21st, we gave a presentation about Bangladesh, nakshi kantha and the film project to a very supportive community group in Gig Harbor. Thanks to everyone for your attention and most importantly for your enthusiasm. We really feel it and appreciate it. And please keep spreading the word.
We continue working with Rita Meher editing the rough cut of the film. Cathy recently recorded some narration for Rita to add to the film to have a better idea of timing and length of scenes. All very exciting.
Surayia, photographed by Anil Advani.
Posted by: Len
Note: Unfortunately the link to the article on the Key Peninsula News website has expired.
The last few months have been filled with work on the film and other adventures, so our blog posts have fallen behind. We will catch up, however, and bring everyone up to date on progress.
We were pleased to see that our community newspaper just published a very nice article about the film project, complete with one of our favorite photos of Cathy, Len and Surayia, taken by Anil Advani when we were in Dhaka nearly two years ago. We were showing Surayia some clips from the very first footage that Mishuk Munier had filmed of Surayia and the women who worked with her.
That photo brings back a mix of emotions: happiness from our time with Surayia and sadness recalling Mishuk’s untimely death. It is always amazing how evocative a single image can be.