Miao Hundred Bird Textile

Three spirals of leaves and flowers, and two of them are clearly going somewhere.

This hundred bird textile is Miao (Hmong), from Guizhou Province, China, and dates to the early 20th century. It is cotton and feather. Miao embroidery in Guizhou is generally worked in silk thread on cotton, with birds, flowers and spirals among the favored subjects. A grid of nine embroidered squares fills the top, swirling coils alternating with flowered fields in pink, gold and cream. A row of smaller panels hangs below, and from them drop beaded strings tipped with white feathers. Black ties run from the upper corners. It is 21 inches wide and 27 long.

A great deal of embroidery, politely contained in squares.