ILHAM CONVERSATIONS
DEEPER THAN INDIGO
Jenny Balfour Paul
8 SEPT
11:00AM
Jenny Balfour Paul, writer, artist, curator, international lecturer and avid traveller is the world’s leading authority on indigo. An Honorary Research Fellow at Exeter University, Trustee of the Royal Geographical Society, Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society and Explorers Club and President of the UK’s Association of Guilds of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers, she has been consultant for indigo exhibitions, educational programmes, documentary films and for Indigo Sutra in Kolkata in 2017, and promotes worldwide revivals of natural dyes.
In this special illustrated talk, the speaker discusses her acclaimed book Deeper than Indigo (2015): biography, memoir and reimagining of the journeys of remarkable 19th century indigo planter and explorer Thomas Machell, whose journals she discovered by serendipity in the British Library. Adventures in his footsteps took her to China and to former indigo and coffee plantation lands in India and Bangladesh. She also followed him by local cargo ship to remote Polynesian islands and by freighter to India via the Red Sea and coasts of Arabia, where both faced pirate attacks.
BICARA ILHAM
DEEPER THAN INDIGO
Jenny Balfour Paul
8 SEPT
11:00PG
Jenny Balfour Paul, penulis, artis, kurator, pensyarah antarabangsa dan pengembara adalah pakar indigo dunia. Beliau merupakan Felo Kehormat Kajian di Universiti Exeter, Pemegang Amanah Royal Geographical Society, Felo Royal Asiatic Society dan Explorers Club, dan Presiden Association of Guilds of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers, konsultan untuk pameran-pameran indigo, program pendidikan, filem dokumentari dan turut giat mempromosi usaha untuk menghidupkan semula penggunaan pewarna asli di seluruh dunia.
Di dalam bicara khas ini beliau akan membincangkan buku beliau Deeper than Indigo (2015), sebuah teks yang menggabungkan biografi, memoir dan pentafsiran semula pengembaraan tokoh penanam indigo dan penjelajah di abad ke-19, Thomas Machell, di mana jurnalnya dijumpai beliau di British Library. Menjejaki kembara Machell membawa beliau ke China dan bekas tapak penanaman indigo dan kopi di India dan Bangladesh. Beliau juga menuruti langkah Machell dengan menaiki kapal kargo tempatan ke kepulauan Polynesia yang terasing dan menaiki kapal angkut ke India melalui Laut Merah dan persisiran pantai Arab, dimana beliau diserang lanun dikedua-dua tempat ini.