THE ARCHER COLLECTION
CC-TAPIS
MILAN, ITALY
The Archer Collection is a new collection of hand-knotted rugs by Iranian artist Taher Asad-Bakhtiari, handcrafted by cc-tapis.
A colourful and expressive collection which unite to explore the energy created by arrows and triangles. “I’m a Saggitarius and to me, the arrow stands for the values or energies – think peace, or success, or love – that we throw into our lives. The arrows are symbols of how we unleash these energies, watch them gain momentum and experience where they end up pointing.” Taher Asad-Bakhtiari.
For the first time cc-tapis presents a collection focused on one typology of rug: the runner. A collection which can be used for corridors, staircases, narrow spaces or freely in any interior. The collection is entirely hand-knotted and produced in the cc-tapis Atelier in Nepal, using Himalayan wool, pure silk, lurex and mohair.
From the seven days of creation to the seven seas, from the seven colours of the rainbow to the seven chakras, the number seven is an auspicious one in the global imagination. A legacy that possibly started when the Babylonians, looking into the sky, made an official record of seven celestial bodies. Quite literally for them, seven was heaven.
From self-taught designer Taher Asad-Bakhtiari comes a rug collection of seven arrows, conceived from a desire – and fueled by current events – to act as protective talismans and inspire a desire to go beyond. The pieces of this collection explore, each in their own right, the highest directions humanity is called to move into.
Individual descriptions of pieces:
1. Centaur draws on the artist’s star sign and pays homage to the half-man, half-heavenly creature conjured by the ancient Greeks to celebrate life as an unbridled ride to freedom through physical pleasures.
2. Spartan yet striking in its opposing two tones of cream and black, Eye of a protector was envisioned as a protective shield bringing clarity and clairvoyance.
3. The two-sided arrow Jade offers a representation of a world looping and reconnecting, with no end and no beginning, spreading the healing powers associated with its namesake stone.
4. In Like a prayer, the artist explores the necessity to break taboos and burn limiting beliefs at the individual and collective levels, resulting in a pyrotechnic cry for freedom in the face of obscurantism.
5. Inspired by ancient Mesopotamian temples, the shadowed tiers of Ziggurat draw the eye upwards, a movement of the undying human urge to link the here and now to the universal and immutable.
6. Pardis is Persian word that birthed the word “paradise”. Here, Asad Bakhtiari offers a variation of an orderly, geometric garden of Eden whose internal arrows heading off-track point nonetheless to unpredictable futures.
7. Sufi is beige in colour and sober in appearance like the wool-wearing followers of Rumi. A nod to the cultural legacy of Persia, Sufi is also a manifest for spiritual freedom and internationalisation.