Those SFBARS members familiar with some of Jim Dixon's rugs from trips to his home in Occidental will be happily surprised to find that only a couple of rugs are repeated in the show "Heavenly Gardens," an exhibition of some 80 rugs from the Dixon rug collection.
The rugs will be showing between November 19th and January 5, 2003 in the Bedford Gallery at the Dean Lesher Regional Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek. It is one of those special shows that comes along only once in a decade. It should not be missed by anyone who loves rugs.
The rugs are partitioned into mini exhibits consisting of Caucasian, Turkish, Chinese/East Turkestan, Persian and Turkmen sections in order to allow viewers unfamiliar with the distinctions between rug areas to get a feeling for what characterizes the different rug groups. Within each grouping there are true rarities as well as surprises.
On the floor facing the Blossom rug is another, although later, carpet from the same group. It is interesting to compare the two rugs; while they have essentially the same design they are separated in age by perhaps a century or more. On the wall next to the "blossom rug" hangs a rare small scale "dragon rug" fragment. Few of these old classic "Kubas" can be found outside museums.
Three colorful Kazaks dominate another wall of this section. Adjacent to them is displayed a wonderful "Memling gul rug" with multiple rows of guls in an astonishing array of colors. [see Dumas' Trefoil, Guls Stars and Gardens, plate 3]
Also in this section is a "forest" rug with trees and paired birds [see Trefoil pl 23] which has a counterpart in a nearly identical rug in Williamsburg, except the Dixon rug has a red rather than a blue field. [See Mildred B. Lanier English and Oriental Carpets at Williamsburg pl 18.] The Dixon rug has a yellow border reminiscent in color to Karagashli rugs, one of which is hung nearby. Two fascinating fragments, of unknown provenance, one with a split leaf design and a stunning bold red and white reciprocal border, another with bold green blossom medallions on a red field with a yellow border are also in this section.
A strange rug with overall tiny sprig-like trees on a beige field has no known counterpart. An unusually long, triple column rug with panels of tulips at either end is perhaps the most arresting rug in the group. Its vine border is similar to borders in rugs from the Karapinar region. Rarely seen in Turkish rugs, two human figures are woven into the field.
Two Turkish "Memling gul" rugs from the Konya area, one a Yatak, and the other a classic yellow field runner, compliment the "Memling gul" rugs in the Caucasian section.
Three "Transylvanian" prayer rugs hang above the entry way to the exhibit next to three Meles prayer rugs. Many rug scholars believe most of the Transylvanian rugs were woven in the Meles area, so it is interesting to compare them here.
Two extraordinary rugs stand out in this section--the first is an ancient-looking square mat with a central medallion and "shamanistic" figures scattered in the corners. The texture looks rather matted and is in a cut looped technique. It was found in Tibet. The second piece sits on a small platform. Woven in silk, it too is square. Mandala-like, it has a lotus leaf surround reminiscent of Buddhist lotus thrones seen in Tibetan bronzes and thankas.
One should note that the show is titled "Heavenly Gardens." Blossoms of all sizes and shapes abound, as do tree rugs in virtually all the sections--from the Tree Kazak and the Bird/Tree rug in the Caucasian section, to the pomegranate tree Khotan in the East Turkestan section, to a fragment of a Khirgis rug with a bold cypress tree in the Turkmen section. A curious rug (Turkish? Afshari?) with cotton weft and an overall field in the Turkmen "kejebe" design also displays cypress trees. The rug design can be interpreted as a water pavilion. The water pavilion theme can be also seen in the Memling gul rugs as well as in several of the Turkish and Caucasian rugs.