The 14th ICOC International Conference will be held in Washington DC from 7-10 June 2018. As in 2015 the ICOC is being held in collaboration with the Textile Museum on the campus of George Washington University. The ICOC includes both conference and academic sessions, a dealer fair, exhibitions and also a conference extension.
The opening reception of the Dealer fair will take place Thursday 7 June in the evening and the conference and academic sessions from Friday 8 June through Sunday 10 June. The conference extension will take place Monday 11 June – Thursday 12 June.
The interesting lecture program includes 19 talks by leading experts on carpets and textiles, and among them ‘Nature or Tradition: The Herati Pond Design’ by Murray Lee Eiland, ‘A carpet with the chintamani motifs in the collection of the National Museum in Kraków’ by Beata Biedronska-Slota, ‘Source of Enrichment of the Azerbaijan Carpet Museum’s Collection’ by Shirin Melikova, ‘The rediscovery of a great masterpiece: the Bardini-Pisa Mamluk’ by Alberto Boralevi, ‘Defregger Rugs’ by Peter Bichler, ‘Goat Hair & Mohair in Oriental Rugs & Textiles’ by John Wertime, ‘Sarajevo vase-technique fragmented carpets from the Shah Nematollah Vali Shrine in Mahan’ by Fatima Kadic-Zutic and ‘The first Ushak Carpet collector’ by Andrea Pacciani just to mention a few of the interesting academic sessions.
The recently restored 16th Cracow Chintamani Cairene Court Carpet (1016 x 373 cm.) was displayed at the Heritage Exhibition in the National Museum (June 2017-January 2018). Its story will be presented by Beata Biedronska-Slota in her talk at ICOC Washington 2018. The Chintamani Carpet will be then exhibited from the end of June till the end of September in an exhibition organized by the Bruschettini Foundtion in Urbino, Italy.Presentation to the Museum staff of the recently acquired Dragon Carpet. A previously unknown 17th c. Dragon carpet, one of the latest acquisitions of Baku Carpet Museum, will be presented during the talk of the new Museum Director Shirin Melikova.Detail of a giant 19th c. Bijar carpet with the Herati as a fish pattern, will be shown during the talk by Murray Lee Eiland: Nature or Tradition: The Herati Pond DesignA tiny fragment from the border of the famous Pisa Mamluk, supposed to have disappeared 80 years ago. The entire carpet will be shown in colors and described in detail only to ICOC delegates attending Alberto Boralevi’s talk: The Rediscovery of a Great Masterpiece: the Bardini-Pisa MamlukDetail of one of the fragments of the famous Persian vase-technique carpet from Mahan, near Kerman, currently exhibited in the National Museum of Sarajevo. The carpet is dated 1656/7 and has the signature of the weaver, “Amal-i Ustād Mu’min Ibn Quṭb al-Dīn Māhānī“, which translates as “The work of master Mu’min, son of Quṭb al-Dīn Māhānī”. Fatima Žutić, who published these fragments in a recent article on Hali Magazine, will present the new discoveries on this topic and a reconstruction of the carpets as they were displayed in the Shah Nematollah Vali Shirne in Mahan.A Medallion Ushak depicted on a 17th c. painting by the Italian artist Bartolomeo Bettera, that will be discussed by Andrea Pacciani in his talk: The First Ushak Carpet Collector.An outstanding and very graphic Central Anatolia goat-hair rug presented by John Wertime in his talk: Goat Hair & Mohair in Oriental Rugs & Textiles: An OverviewDefregger Carpets from the Alpine Region in Tyrol are totally unknown to carpet specialists and will be illustrated by Peter Bichler.
