Molas: What They Are, How to Make Them, Ideas They Suggest for Creative Applique

New York Cincinatti, Ohio: Van Nostrand Reinhold Company - A Division of Littonn Educational Publishing, Inc., 1980. First Paperback Edition . Trade Paperback. Very Good. 8 1/2" X 11. Auld, Lawrence - Phhotographs. 112 Pages Indexed. No marks of any sort. Molas, the colorful applique panels created by the Cuna Indians, almost all of whom live in the San Bias Territory of Panama, are unique. Similar needlework is not to be found anywhere else in the world, even among neighboring Indian tribes with related cultures. A good many misconceptions are held about these handmade molas, especially in the United States where much that is incorrect has been written about them in popular literature. It has been said, for instance, that they go back to antiquity. Yet they are a modern invention, never having been made of anything except machine-manufactured cloth secured by the Cuna through trade channels that became well established only in the mid-1800s. The less complex forms of the art go back not much further than the beginning of this century (20th) while the more elaborate kinds date from about the 1940s. The craft represents, in fact, the adaptation to its own needs, by a nonindustrial people, of imported, mass-produced goods. This book looks at molas, their history, and the Indians who make them primarily from the point of view of the contemporary craftsman, and, although there can be no attempt here to catalog designs, much of the information in the book ought to be of interest to collectors as well. The later chapters describe in detail how to construct the panels, and it will come as a surprise to some, but not to all, that the method shown is quite different from "reverse applique," which, for over a decade, has been widely believed to be the mola-making process but which is really a gross oversimplification of what the Cuna women do. The authentic mola technique is almost pure applique, although it is true that the Indians begin their work by stacking up several layers of cloth. Nevertheless, reverse applique is not ignored here. Born in an attempt to explain how to make a mola the concept was a happy accident which resulted in a brand new challenge for craftsman. Reverse applique is described in detail in Chapter 5.