Bringing South Asian textiles to life through an exhibit focused on sensory experiences.
Garments are meant to be worn and therefore felt. When they are presented behind glass in a museum, our experience is limited only to seeing them. In this collaboration between RISD’s
Centering cultural associations, memories, and place-based details, we selected four garments in the museum’s collection for their distinctive sensory properties and richness of hand, as well as the stories of cultural exchange and collaboration embedded in their making. The exhibit encourages visitors to contemplate historical textiles through material modeling, garment simulation, audio narrations, and haptic experiences.
more images coming soon...
Through this exhibition, viewers are invited to experience the language, sound, feeling, smell, and taste of the world of four South Asian textiles.
South Asian textiles come alive through wrapping, pleating, tucking, and draping. Unfortunately, many textiles from museum collections are too fragile to be exhibited this way.
Digital materials are created using physically based renderings (PBRs) that separate the textile's surface texture into multiple optical channels. Doing this provides a more accurate picture of how different materials and textures interact with light in a virtual environment. VTRG has developed an innovative approach to creating digital materials that convey the sensory silhouettes of historic textiles.
Digital materials were modeled using sensory visual descriptions, capturing topographical textile information, and then creating a 3D simulation, creating an immersive digital experience of the physical artifact.
Here the museum’s thirma bagh phulkari is modeled to enhance the velvety feel of the satin-stitch embroidery.
This has been achieved by parametrically modeling the woven ground and embroidery overlay as two digital materials, and then combining them. Stitch density is one parameter built into the model that can be varied to give a sense of the textile's texture.
Much of the emotional draw of textiles involves multiple senses, including the pleasures of wearing, touching, and smelling. These lyrical audio descriptions evoke sensory landscapes that animate and enrich the garments on view behind glass.
Project for RISD, 20 weeks
Material modeling, garment simulation, audio narrations, haptic experiences, physically based renderings, sensory visual descriptions, 3D simulation, label writing
Developed with
Advised by Kate Irvin and Joy Ko
Images Courtesy of RISD Museum