From warp and weft to zero and one: The contribution of ancient weaving to digital technology
Warp and weft, zero and one: What has one of the oldest technologies of textile production to do with binary code? An international research team at Deutsches Museum and the Museum for Plaster Casts Munich sets out to investigate the contribution of ancient weaving to the history of science and technology, especially digital technology. The research work of the group will be funded by one of the most prestigious grants of the European Union: an ERC Consolidator Grant of around two Million Euro. The artist, philosopher and mathematician Dr. Ellen Harlizius-Klück will lead the project entitled “PENELOPE – A Study of Weaving as Technical Mode of Existence.”
„The name PENELOPE stands for the most famous weaver of antiquity, the wife of Odysseus, and reminds us of the female share in the history of technology – the counterpart of LEONARDO as figurehead of the art-and-technology scene so to speak”, Ellen Harlizius-Klück says. For several years, the artist, philosopher and mathematician investigated ancient textile technology. Currently, together with the British programmer Alex McLean, the Italian ethnologist Flavia Carraro and the Italian philologist Giovanni Fanfani she explores the impact upon the upcoming sciences in the Greek Revolution. The research project entitled “PENELOPE – A Study of Weaving as Technical Mode of Existence” will last five years and is funded with 2 million Euros by an ERC Consolidator Grant within the EU research framework HORIZON 2020.
The four researchers will work at two locations in Munich: „Base station for the research is the Institute for the History of Technology at Deutsches Museum“, says principal investigator Ellen Harlizius-Klück. “The laboratory where we construct digital machines for the simulation and testing of ancient weaving on the warp weighted loom will be established in the Museum for Plaster Casts, Königsplatz – providing a suitable context close to the National Collection of Antiquities and the Glyptothek.”
At this place, ancient and modern topologies of weaving will be scrutinized and coded in order to make them virtually explorable. Warp and weft, zero and one: “Woven fabrics are basically constructed of threads crossing over or under each other”, says Ellen Harlizius-Klück, “which makes weaving a digital and even binary technology.” She states that it is is time to reconsider weaving “as an important part of intellectual history and especially the history of digital technology.”
Hence the hypothesis of the PENELOPE-Project is that textile technology significantly contributed to the emergence of the sciences in ancient Greece. “We propose the labyrinth of threads as a paradigm for this development.” The pattern logic of woven fabrics served as pattern for thoughts, the structure of the weave was transferred to the order of the cosmos and set sciences in motion and form.
Alex McLean will develop codes and investigate algorithms of ancient weaving. Flavia Carraro takes an anthropological view on the research material and will do comparative ethnological studies. And Giovanni Fanfani will explore ancient poetical, philosophical and cosmological texts. All three researchers are long term employed in Munich for the first time.
In contrast, to Ellen Harlizius-Klück, the head of the research group, the project implies a return to a familiar place of activity: „Ten years ago, I was Scholar-in-Residence at the Research Institute working on a rare weaver book in possession of the library. After two years as Marie-Curie-Research Fellow at the Department of Humanities in Copenhagen, I wanted to go back to the context of the history of technology at Deutsches Museum.“
Weitere Informationen:
http://www.deutsches-museum.de/index.php
http://www.deutsches-museum.de/de/forschung/forschungsbereich-wtg/schwerpunkt-i/cluster-2/penelope/?sword_list[]=penelope&no_cache=1
http://penelope.hypotheses.org
https://erc.europa.eu/
https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/
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