Indigo surrounds us
perhaps more than any other textile dye.
Few modern craftsmen have
unlocked its potential better than
Aboubakar Fofana, who has studied
traditional indigo production techniques
for over three decades and on three
continents: at home in Mali,
inside ethnology museums in Paris,
and alongside Masakazu Akiyama,
a Japanese master dyer.
“We were trained by adults to
recognize the different plants in the forest,”
he says. “They would say, ‘This one
is very good when you cut yourself’ or they'd
tell us to gather a certain tree bark to
make red dye. That was when I heard from
the old ladies about indigo . . . .”
“Of the blues with natural indigo,
I can make 12 different blues, from very light to
very dark—I discovered that traditionally,
to be an indigo dyer, you have
to master these 12 different shades,” he says.
“Each has a different name and each
has a specific emotion”.
Fofana declines to name
a favorite blue (“It's like a father with his
children—I love them all”),
but there is a tone that remains special
for its elusiveness. “Perhaps I'm looking
for my specific blue, and I'm sure
I'll never find it”.
