“A Thousand Patterns of the Chul” exhibition opened at the Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum.
The exhibition presents 25 beautiful and richly patterned chul samples from the museum’s collection, woven in various regions of Azerbaijan – Baku, Shirvan, Gazakh and Karabakh.
Chul is a decorative cloth that covered and decorated the backs of different beasts of burden (horses, camels, donkeys and oxen). In Azerbaijan, it was mainly made with pile- and flat-weaving techniques and sometimes with embroidery techniques, such as gulabatin (gold embroidery), takalduz (chain stitch embroidery), julma (bird’s eye) and patchwork. In order to beautify camels and horses for ceremonies and folk festivals, they were covered with chul. In winter, chul was used to protect animals against cold.
A clay figure of a horse with an image of a floral-patterned chul (2nd millennium BCE), found in Maku in South Azerbaijan and a gold bowl with a lion with a chul (1st millennium BCE), discovered in Teppe Hasanlu next to lake Urmia, proves that the chul is an antique item. Depictions of chuls adorned with rich patterns can also be found in the works of renowned artists of the Tabriz miniature school.
During the Middle Ages, a chul was made of colourful wool and silk, sometimes – gold and silver threads and precious stones for the horses of rulers and court noblemen.
The exhibition will run until April 1.
