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White or light yellow is the natural color of maguey fibers; for any other color, dyes are necessary. In most of the country, bright pink, green, yellow , and purple aniline dyes are favored because they are easy to use and relatively inexpensive, plus the colors are bright, which is preferable. The powdered dye is sold by the ounce in local stores. However, aniline-dyed maguey fibers will run if they get wet, because a mordant (fixative) is not used. I never saw unspun or spun aniline-dyed maguey fibers for sale in a market or shop. Before the invention of synthetic dyes by Sir William Henry Perkins in 1857 (osborne 1965, 35), natural materials were gathered and processed to color maguey fibers. Concepción Tutuapa is one municipality where I saw a natural dye commonly used with maguey. Red-brown is the color manufactured and it comes from the cambium, or inner bark, of the aliso (alder) tree (Alnus acuminate [Betulacae family]). To get the strongest color, first the right tree must be found. Incisions are cut into the bark of several trees, and after a few minutes, a deep red color appears. The tree with the darkest shade is selected; chunks cut from this tree are chopped into smaller bits and placed in a pot of water along with cut-up avocado pits. Themixtureisboiledforapproximatelyfortyminutes.Thenthemaguey fibers are added and “cooked” for about an hour. The pot is removed from the fire and liquid cal (powdered hydrogenated limestone combined with water) is added to the mixture. (Cal is very important in Guatemala and is sold in every market, as it is used for softening corn kernels when making masa, or cornmeal. Raw cal is mined and fired in high-temperature kilns before it is usable.) Sometimes ashes are added. Wisdom noticed that cal softened the fibers and ash altered the color (1940, 154). The fibers are left overnight to cool. 8 Colors and Patterns 72 THE MAGUEY To TEXTILE TRANSFoRMATIoN The alder dyes do not run because the tannins in the bark and the avocado pits are natural mordants (although I discovered later that sometimes the dyes are not completely fixed, most likely because the dye bath did not reach the proper temperature, the time spent in the dye bath was too short to set them, or the excess dyes were not rinsed out entirely). To best prevent colors from fading or running, when the clean, damp fibers are placed in the bath, the water temperature should build slowly to a temperature of 190ºF (88ºC) and be held for about an hour, during which the fibers should be gently rotated, to even out the exposure and give better coverage (Wipplinger 1996, 50). Unspun aliso-dyed fibers are sold in the local markets alongside bags with the distinct red-brown stripes. o’Neale wrote of bags with red-brown stripes from the Cobán area (1945, 182), and I would guess that aliso was used to obtain this color. In 2002, I became aware of a small resurgence of naturally dyed maguey in Jocotán and olopa, where dye workshops sponsored by Capacitador de Artesanos and AMo took place. The knowledge of extracting colors from palo de pito (Erythrina sp.), coconut (Cocus nucifera L.), nance (Byronima crassifolia), guava (Psidium guajaba L.), and cedro (Cedrela mexicana M. Roem.) plants was reintroduced. Interestingly, indigo or añil (Indigofera guatemalensis ), so important to Jocotán prior to synthetic dyes, is now imported from Momostenango because it no longer grows in the area. By 2009 all of the products sold by AMo were made with naturally dyed maguey. Wisdom also observed natural-dye use in Jocotán during the 1940s. The most important dyes were yellow from the bark of the logwood or palo de campeche (Haematoxylum campechianum L.); red from palo de Brazil (Haematoxylum brasiletto Karsten); and yellow from the roots, leaves, buds, twigs, and stalks of fustic and coral trees. The design on most bags is stripes, with stripe direction determined by the construction technique. Looped bags always have horizontal stripes, because they are worked in spirals and the colored strands follow the working line. Most bags have three to six stripes that are three or four rows wide, although I have seen bags with up to ten stripes. Woven bags have vertical stripes because the woven panel that forms the bag is always warp faced. Woven bags usually have two to four str ipes. Linked bags also have vertical stripes...

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