1932 -
Scholar, collector, and conservator of traditional Palestinian and Jordanian embroidery, costumes, and textiles.
Born to a Christian Palestinian Arab family in Tulkarem, in British Mandate Palestine, Widad Qaʿwar (née Irani) and her brothers were sent to Lebanon for primary school. Because of heightened tensions and uncertainty in Palestine, she was brought home in the mid-1940s to complete her secondary education at the Friends Girls School in Ramallah. The shock, upheaval, and sudden transformations of Palestinian society in 1948 and 1949 initially sparked her desire to collect and preserve examples of traditional Palestinian folk culture.
Qaʿwar returned to Lebanon and continued her studies at the Beirut College for Women (now the Lebanese American University), receiving a B.A. in history in 1950. She pursued postgraduate studies at the American University of Beirut and there met Kamil Amin Qaʿwar, her future husband, with whom she settled in Jordan.
Qaʿwar's unique collection of embroidery (in Arabic, tatriz) preserves a fading way of life and the cultural heritage of Palestinian women and village life. Each village is characterized by its own embroidery styles, patterns, and color schemes. From two traditional embroidered dresses that she received as a gift, Qaʿwar's collection has grown to become the largest and richest collection of Palestinian, Jordanian, and Syrian costumes now extant the Hashimite kingdom of Jordan. Qaʿwar's interests extend beyond collecting. She has also conducted interviews with village women about the transmission, practice, and innovation of the ancient craft of embroidery, with a special focus on the communal and political dimensions of embroidery from the late 1960s onward.
The June 1967 war prevented Qaʿwar from visiting the villages of her childhood. The hardships of occupation, and the creation of a new group of Palestinian refugees, strengthened her desire to collect as many examples of embroidery as possible.
After 1968, Qaʿwar focused on documenting and researching the history of Palestinian textiles, particularly on the wedding trousseaus of the women in the village of Bayt Dajan, near Jaffa, who were now living in refugee camps in and around Amman. A hand-woven wedding garment was usually part of the trousseau. Each trousseau features six to twelve embroidered garments, including accessories such as scarves and pillowcases.
Embroidery patterns and themes were drawn from daily life and natural surroundings. Trees, houses, flowers, and insects are all found in Palestinian needlework, which uses four types of stitches. Al-madda (stretch/extending), was found in the Galilee but also in Nablus and Tulkarm. It is characterized by its simplicity. Falahi (meaning "of the peasants") is a cross-stitch found in most Palestinian embroidery. Tahrira (to make silky) is a more complicated stitch originating in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. It is made from silk, first imported from Syria. The wasla (connecting) stitch is new, appearing after 1967. It depicts images of the Palestinian flag, Jerusalem, and the Dome of the Rock, and has acquired different names in different locales, knows as swaisiya or sabaly in the Jaffa area, manaajel in the areas between Ramallah and Hebron, aqeedeh in Gaza, and tanbeeteh in Beersheeba.
Qaʿwar's collection of embroidery and textiles has grown to include examples from other Arab countries. She has taken the collection on tour in Europe and is committed to using it as an educational resource on Palestinian culture and history. In 1990, she was a founding member of the Arab Resource Center for the Popular Arts in Beirut.
Bibliography
Arab Resource Center for the Popular Arts/al-Jana. Available from http://www.oneworld.org/al-jana.
Kawar, Amal. Daughters of Palestine: Leading Women of the Palestinian National Movement. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996.
— LAURIE KING-IRANI
