What do the designs on molas represent?
These small appliqued triangles symbolise the shape of the bamboo huts, being the home of the Kuna. They represent being protected by the family. The vertical slots imitate the sun beams shining through the bamboo walls of traditional Kuna homes. They also mean being protected by the family.
What mola designs are most popular?
The most popular mola designs include birds, fish, animals, flowers, and plants, but artisans also incorporate images from everyday life, including commercial logos, buildings, boats, vehicles, and household objects.
Is mola an art of Panama?
Molas, a traditional textile craft, are made from layers of colored fabric that are stitched and cut using applique techniques to create patterns and pictures. They originated in Panama, with the women of the Kuna tribe in the San Blas islands.
What are the traditional colors of molas?
Each mola consists of two to seven layers of cotton cloth in the dominant colors of red, black, and orange. Pieces of the top layers are cut out, folded back, and hand-stitched down to expose the underlying colors.
What is a Panamanian mola?
Molas are a brightly colored textile art created by the Kuna tribe from the San Blas Blas region of Panama. Mola means cloth or clothing in the Kuna language. These panels of stacked cloth are used to make women’s blouses. Girls learn to make these at an early age and can spend up to 100 hours making one Mola!
Where are the molas from?
Panama
Molas are a brightly colored textile art created by the Kuna tribe from the San Blas Blas region of Panama. Mola means cloth or clothing in the Kuna language. These panels of stacked cloth are used to make women’s blouses. Girls learn to make these at an early age and can spend up to 100 hours making one Mola!
Where can molas be found?
Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. The Mola or Molas is a hand-made textile that forms part of the traditional women’s clothing of the indigenous Guna people from Panamá, Central America, and Colombia, South America.
What are molas who makes them?
What is the purpose of selling molas?
The traditional purpose of molas was to decorate functional items of clothing. Today, the Kuna sell molas to tourists as a way to earn money.
What does mola mean in Panama?
What is a Mola painting?
The old traditional geometric designs of the body painting are still used in contemporary Mola. In the past 50 years the Kuna also started to depict realistic and abstract designs of flowers, animals and humans. So Molas are often used as “living history books”, showing hidden symbols of medical plants, protective symbols or legends and stories.
What are the characteristics of contemporary Mola?
The old traditional geometric designs of the body painting are still used in contemporary Mola. In the past 50 years the Kuna also started to depict realistic and abstract designs of flowers, animals and humans.
When was the first Mola made?
The exact date when reverse applique was used for the first time, is not known, but it is assumed the the first Molas have been made 150 – 170 years ago. The old traditional geometric designs of the body painting are still used in contemporary Mola.