This program was hosted by Weave A Real Peace (www.weavearealpeace.org) in August of 2024.

This program was focused on the textile traditions of Uzbekistan! Join us as we delve into a panel discussion of the exquisite textile traditions of Central Asia; enthusiastically colorful ikats, delicately stitched Suzani. The silks of the ancient Silk Road still beckon.

Marilyn Romatka’s focus is living folk art crafts. She teaches a wide variety, from painting techniques to weaving, the common thread being that the techniques are all deeprooted in a culture from around the world. She provides video classes, documentary/travelogues of folk art techniques at Taproot Video online, and has recently released her first featurelength documentary film Interlacement: Threads & Lives, a film about ‘friendship through handwoven fabric’. Marilyn’s work educating the general public about Uzbek textile techniques has included dozens of presentations at weaving guilds across the nation, and she was a guest lecturer on the subject at the Seattle Art Museum during their recent ikat exhibition. She likes to say she has the best job in the world; she travels to various countries gathering folk art techniques, then returns to the US to teach enthusiastic students!

Rikki Quintana founded HoonArts Fair Trade in a leap of faith, after retiring from her law career. Starting from “zero” as the first to build a US market for Tajikistani handicrafts, HoonArts is now a verified fair trade business, working with artisan groups in 3 Central Asian countries: Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. She also leads tours to Central Asia. HoonArts is helping to empower over 100 artisans, mostly rural women. Rikki is passionate about using her longterm partnerships with master artists to open a doorway to this region, and give her clients unique and personalized products, travel, and educational experiences they can’t get anywhere else.

Aziz Murtazaev is the head of Marikat (formerly known as Crafts Studio IkatUz), located in Margilan, Uzbekistan (the Uzbek center of traditional ikat and silk weaving). Marikat is a cooperative of independent artists in the fields of ikat weaving, natural dyeing and block printing, which unites more than 5 masters, 9 workers and 35 weavers, and serves as an open platform for creating opportunities for these masters to introduce their products in new regional and international markets. The main goals and tasks of the cooperative are to cooperate closely with each other for the benefit of preserving traditional craftsmanship and cultural values, and their development and transfer to the next generation. Aziz’ individual artistic specialty is dyeing, and especially working with natural dyes. In addition to working with Marikat, Aziz has served as the most recent president of the Asia Pacific Region of the World Craft Council, as well as holding leadership positions in the national organization of craftsmen of Uzbekistan. In these positions, he works to create opportunities for Uzbek and other regional artisans, improve their skills and find new markets, as well as passing their skills to the next generation.