Fatma Nənə Hana Uzadir: Seeing and Tasting the Form in the Weavings of Lümə-Dərə Women

This paper is an invitation to accept and to apply the senses in the field of ethnographic research of art. I tried to embed the aesthetic dimension of handmade fabrics woven by Lümə-Dərə community– one of Tərəkəmə clans in Northwest Iran- in their sensual world and make an approach toward understanding it. Therefore, I have made a bridge between anthropology of aesthetics and the anthropology of the senses. Focused on handmade fabrics, my field work has done in Lümə-Dərə. My ethnographic experience showed me that the motifs and designs woven on these fabrics cannot be analyzed via a macro-level and reductionist approach using written literary and mythological resources. In contrast, one should try to achieve a perception close to people creating fabrics, and to embed these forms in a context of real lived experience amongst those people. Toranj is a common shape among Iranian local and ethnic communities and art researchers mostly comprehend this shape by its meaning or aesthetic dimension. In this research, however, it is shown by reviewing Lümə-Dərə designs that the importance of water in images woven on the fabrics is routed in common values and local philosophy of this ethnic community.