LONDON – Raja Permaisuri Agong Tunku Hajah Azizah Aminah Maimunah Iskandariah will be heading a delegation to promote and exhibit the woven textiles of Tenun Pahang Diraja in the London Craft Week (LCW) in May.
“This is the first time they (the textiles) are going out of Malaysia to be part of the London Craft Week,” said Tunku Azizah during a brief respite from working in preparation for the annual exhibition recently, which celebrates outstanding British and international creativity.
During the week-long festival, around 250 established and emerging makers, designers, brands and galleries from around the world will converge to showcase their products.
The Tenun Pahang Diraja exhibition, showcasing textile pieces made by prisoners from Penor and Bentong Prisons, will be held at the Malaysian High Commission building in Belgrave Square.
Her Majesty, who is the patron of the Yayasan Tenun Pahang Diraja, said she was excited at the prospect of showcasing the centuries-old Pahang weaving tradition, which she described as “bringing penjara Penor and penjara Bentong to London.”
“I am just bringing tenun from the prisons because I want the world to know about the work that we do.
“We will be bringing our wardens here (to the exhibition), wardens who have never had any art training in their life and now they are teaching the prisoners, how to weave,” said Tunku Azizah.
Visitors to the exhibition will also be able to feast their eyes on old pieces of textiles from Pahang, as well as pieces that had been designed from sketches to the final product by Tunku Azizah herself.
“This is so that people can see how far we have come from the past 15 years since I took over from 2005, when I took over Tenun Pahang and gave it a new name.
Source: NEW STRAITS TIMES
