ArtsNational Narrabri will be welcoming UK author Chris Aslan when he presents his talk ‘A Carpet Ride to Khiva’ in the Narrabri RSL auditorium on Monday, July 28.
Author Chris Aslan originally travelled to Uzbekistan for Operation Mercy, an international relief and development organisation.
The idea was that he would write a travel guide about Khiva and the immediate surrounding area, but in the end what he did was to stay for seven years, setting up a workshop where traditional methods of dyeing and weaving were used to create forgotten carpet designs from the days of the Silk Road.
This talk will tell how the work took Chris, with funding from UNESCO and Operation Mercy, to the bazaars of Afghanistan to purchase natural dyes, and to the great libraries and museums of Europe to track down 15th century manuscripts to revive carpet designs and embroideries from their illuminations.
He saw the lives of women transformed and became the largest private employer in town.
Chris spent his childhood in Turkey and Lebanon, and much of his adult life in Central Asia.
He is a writer, a lecturer on art and textiles, and a leader of tours to Central Asia.
Chris was born in Turkey (hence the name Aslan) and spent his childhood there and in war-torn Beirut.
After school, Chris spent two years at sea before studying media and journalism at Leicester University.
He then moved to Khiva, a desert oasis in Uzbekistan, becoming the largest non-government employer in town.
Seven years later, he was kicked out as part of an anti-Western purge going on at the time and took a year in Cambridge to write one of many books, A Carpet Ride to Khiva.
Chris then spent several years in the Pamirs mountains of Tajikistan, training yak herders to comb their yaks for their cashmere-like down.
Next came a couple more years in Kyrgyzstan living in the world’s largest natural walnut forest and establishing a wood-carving workshop.
Since then, Chris has studied and rowed at Oxford, and is now based in Cambridge, but with plans to move to North Cyprus.
When he’s not lecturing, he writes.
Chris is also a tour guide in Central Asia, returning whenever he can having left a large chunk of his heart there.
ArtsNational Narrabri is part of a volunteer-led organisation offering a wide spectrum of arts-related topics to 36 societies across Australia.
The talks last for approximately one hour, followed by complimentary drinks and canapés with an opportunity to chat with our guest speaker.
A raffle will be held on the night featuring two books authored by Chris.
