Interview, Work

“Tweezers, pliers,” the master ordered his assistant. Then he bent over the thick fabric, cut into it, and inserted a thick thread with a thick needle – “like an implant.” Who knows whether Farzad Koushki’s medical terminology is woven into his language because he once studied medicine or because he sets about restoring Persian carpets with as much attention as if he had a patient in front of him…

The patient was a carpet from the area around the Iranian city of Tabriz, and was brought to the workshop by a collector from Slovenia. “It’s about a hundred years old, the broken edges and fringes need to be restored,” Farzad Koushki diagnosed. The Iranian has been living in Ljubljana for fifteen years – he has a shop, gallery and restoration workshop for Persian carpets at Gornji trg 12.

How do you know it’s a hundred years old, I’m curious – considering that it’s unlikely that a Persian carpet would have an ID. “This can be judged by the pattern, color, knotting method… A carpet is like a painting, it’s a work of art,” the master tried to explain the basics of traditional Iranian craftsmanship. On one side, the edge had already been made, the difference between the old and new parts was not noticeable. “Seven centimeters of the edge had to be restored,” he pointed to the line from where he added the missing part with a colorful pattern to the old carpet. How did he know what pattern to make if the edge was completely missing was another question from laymen. Farzad showed the sequence of characters on the sides of the carpet: “The pattern is repetitive, you just have to look at it in the preserved areas, and then it’s not difficult to repeat it.” Otherwise, they know two basic patterns, floral and geometric, and you can trace “infinity” or symmetrically in four units (lachak toranj).

On the other side of the carpet, he was still making a new warp, on which he would then string the knots. “We need to find out how the carpet is made, what is the thickness of the thread, what is the color…” he said as he cut into the still healthy tissue again and inserted a new thread with a thick needle; he used pliers to help pull it out (only four or five simple tools are needed to make such complex fabrics). Each thread required a lot of attention, precision and, above all, patience. “We need two or three weeks just for the new warp,” Farzad tried to illustrate. Once the warp is finished, the carpet will go on a large stand, and then he will start making the knots. The number of knots on carpets varies depending on the material it is made of, but just over an inch, a square meter has 200,000 knots. For large carpets, the number is in the tens of millions. They also follow a pattern by counting the knots: “Two red, one gold, 20 white …,” Farzad counted, for example. Finally, he will make tassels from the remaining warp, which are actually the beginning and end of the carpet. “When it is restored, it will be worth 50,000 euros,” he estimated.

Less respectable was the kilim, about 50 years old, with large holes in the middle made by moths. It was attached to a stand, already patched in one place, and a base made in another. In this case, the value was not measured so much in euros as in the preciousness of the memories. “An old carpet always has value.” In Iranian society, a carpet is a basic piece of every home – even if a person does not have a home, say a nomad. “You can cover yourself with a carpet, sit on it, sleep on it…” Farzad explained. And like many of his compatriots, carpets have accompanied him practically since birth. He belongs to the Lori tribe from the Zagros Mountains, and all family members have been involved in carpet weaving. “Often, parents start making a carpet when a child is born. Over the years, it gains value and is a kind of investment in the child’s future or a dowry at the wedding,” he explained with enthusiasm.

Attachment to carpets is part of the culture, and so you could easily meet a salesman in Iran sitting next to a stack of thousands of carpets and not being upset because the pile hasn’t shrunk in a while. “I never buy a carpet that I don’t like either. That’s why I never regret not selling one,” Farzad smiled. He has more than five hundred carpets, woven and knotted, in his shop in the old town of Ljubljana. So how does he perceive Slovenian homes, which are often permeated by minimalism and equate carpets with dust collectors? “I don’t mind if there aren’t any carpets, but I think it’s a shame that people don’t know about this wealth,” he replied modestly.

Before moving to Ljubljana, he had already spent a considerable amount of time in Europe. He left Iran at the age of seventeen; he studied in Germany, Romania, and even Turkey, he listed. “I studied medicine, but in the end I chose tradition. I think that’s why I’m happier,” he noted with a smile. After 12 years abroad, he returned to Iran and lived there for four years, before traveling again. His extended family still does business in Europe and the United States, and he also has a company in New York, as he revealed in passing, but he chose Ljubljana as his home: “I really like it in Slovenia. Regarding Ljubljana, I agree with the mayor that it is the most beautiful city in the world, but I would only add ‘the safest’.” Sitting next to him was his assistant Aleš Krhin – “one of the reasons he stayed in Slovenia,” as the Iranian exclaimed. Aleš is an ethnologist by training, and carpets are also part of his interest, although he only developed this interest when he met Farzad. “His family welcomed me warmly. I am very grateful to them for opening the door to the wonderful world of carpets, which are an essential part of Persian art,” he said. Farzad also took him to school, so he now knows how to restore carpets, although this is still mainly the work of a master. If he really wanted to master it, he would have to go to Iran to study.

Farzad returns to Iran several times a year, after all, he can only get the right material there: “I buy wool, cotton, silk there… The materials in Europe are not suitable, they don’t have the right structure, in Iran we have a special type of sheep that have hair with more lanolin and long fibers.” He doesn’t accept anything that even resembles synthetics into his workshop. Persian carpets are made of cotton, wool, silk or animal hair, and all by hand, otherwise they simply aren’t Persian. In Europe, carpets are often called that because of the pattern, which is of course completely wrong, the interlocutor smiled.

A Persian carpet can easily survive a hundred years; if it is not too much strained, even more. Farzad immediately remembered the carpet from Goriška Brda, which he restored last year. It is 150 years old, but still very beautiful. “In some places in the world, Persian carpets could serve their purpose for two or three hundred years, but in the European humidity this is impossible,” he warned, mentioning in passing that the oldest carpet found in Siberia is around 2,500 years old. Because it was frozen, it is still perfectly preserved, which confirms its long tradition. The lifespan of a carpet depends a lot on the material, but to a large extent on the environment in which it lives. “Wool, for example, is significantly more durable in a dry space.” Of course, the key factors are still the effects that carpets are subjected to from shoes, animals, furniture, moths, moisture, chemicals that people use to clean them but end up doing more damage, and ultimately, lack of maintenance, Farzad listed.

In the same breath, when he mentioned the dust particles that eventually burrow into the base of the carpet and gradually destroy it, he rejects the ingrained belief that the carpet “makes dust”. “On the contrary,” he exclaimed, “the carpet attracts dust to itself. It is not only a useful and beautiful product, but also a filter. Wool contains lanolin, which retains dust unless the carpet is moved.” And since the craft is still tied to traditional materials, paints and very simple tools, its maintenance is the same as we were used to from the times when carpet racks were mandatory in front of houses and apartment blocks: they need to be beaten well at least once a year. And washed with water, not with all the possible poisons offered by the merchants. Farzad turned to the carpet behind him and gently stroked it, respectfully concluding: “It has been soft for 20 years. The surface does not get dirty, only dust particles accumulate inside. “It just needs to be properly cared for. One thread is like one pixel, each one is important.”

Source: Work, Simona Bandur

Photo: Blaž Samec