In many places of Africa, dying material has
become a source of income generating for many
groups of African women.
Sr.
Hildegard Nagel, who is an artist, started a
cooperative of "tie and dye" in Lusaka
with women affected by AIDS/HIV. She taught
the women the art of combining colours and making
beautiful patterns. Later on the women were
taught sewing and they were able to sew beautiful
clothes out of the material they themselves
had produced.
In
the "tie and dye", the material is
tied with string following a certain pattern.
In other cases instead of string, the material
is sewn and puckered together so that the dye
does not penetrate certain parts of the material.
Then the material is dived in the dye. The free
parts take the colour of the dye while the attached
parts maintain the original color of the material.
It is this that makes the pattern.
The
harmony of colours and the beauty of the patterns
explain the "popularity" of the material
made at the Lusaka cooperative.
