Qarajeh to Quba

Mike Tschebull

Tuesday, January 21, 2020

Jim Opie has noted in his review in HALI book review:

“Qarajeh to Quba, Raoul Tschebull’s important and beautiful book, produced by HPL, on ‘Rugs and Flatweaves from East Azarbayjan and the Transcaucasus’ from his own collection corrects more than past errors in spelling and nomenclature. It advances the study of two important bodies of weavings to new heights of accuracy. In so doing, ‘Mike’ Tschebull replaces old ‘foundation stones’ with fieldwork-based information and distillations from fifty years of travel, research, and well-honed aesthetic sensibilities. Rarely does a single volume accomplish so much through an author’s striving for accuracy, combined with superlative taste.”

Mike Tschebull is a collector of ethnographic textiles with an attraction to cultural anthropology, interested in color, pattern, taxonomy and evolution of design. Through chance and opportunity, he ended up specializing in rural and nomad wool rugs and flatweaves from the Transcaucasus and neighboring East Azarbayjan, in Iran. Tschebull spent time in both places and has done fieldwork in backcountry East Azarbayjan. Tschebull was urged by Russ Pickering and Walter Denny to publish his experiences plus images and descriptions of what he had collected, resulting in a recently released narrative with edited fieldnotes, Qarajeh to Quba. He will use PPT to illustrate aspects of collector authoring and self publishing, this book being an example, will discuss especially rug and flatweave design evolution and the differences between the two targeted geographic areas. Many slides Tschebull will use are unpublished.

His book “Qarajeh to Quba” is available here under Tschebull or from Amazon.