February Evening Meeting & Program: In search of Wild Silk with Karen Selk: Muga and Eri

Wild silk is much more than the miraculous journey of metamorphosis from caterpillar to silken luxury. It is tightly woven to an ancient living culture raising tasar, muga, and eri silkworms in remote forests of central and eastern India. Raising wild silkworms, reeling cocoons, spinning fiber, and weaving silk cloth provides sustainable work and a regular income, while protecting the environment, lifting the status of women, and maintaining a traditional lifestyle. 

In this Zoom presentation, Karen will share photos and stories captured from weavers, spinners, and silkworm farmers over thirty years of field research, and will transport you into their homes and villages to witness the love and dedication involved in each part of the process from soil to cloth.  

Bio

All things silk has provided Karen Selk with a thread that binds together travel, research, writing, artwork, educating, and managing a successful business selling silk yarns and fibres for over 50 years.  She has given hundreds of workshops and presentations on silk and weaving worldwide and has written over fifty articles on silk.    Her passion to learn about everything silk has led her throughout Asia and the wild silk forests of India in particular, for more than 30 years.  The culmination of her field research has been published in a book: In Search of Wild Silk: Exploring a Village Industry in the Jungles of India. She lives on Salt Spring Island, BC, in the Salish Sea on the west coast of Canada. 

Publications

In Search of Wild Silk: Exploring a Village Industry in the Jungles of India, published March 2023 by Schiffer Publishing.

Magazine Articles in 2023/24

• Selvedge – Issue 113
• Shuttle Spindle & Dyepot – Summer 2023
• Textile Asia Journal – September 2023
• Creative Fibre – June 2023
• Embroidery Canada – Fall 2023
• Textile Fibre Forum – December 2023
• SpinOff – Winter 24/25

Website:  www.karenselk.com

Note that there will not be an in-person meeting this month!

Join the Zoom meeting by clicking this link:
https://zoom.us/j/2290207971?pwd=elJvd2w0L2NsMlJPZXhNM3JlTFphZz09