Alighiero Boetti is celebrated for his embroidered tapestries - Arazzi, Mappe and Tutto - conceptual collaborations that resulted in mesmerising works of art that encapsulated many of the ideas he sought to explore in his lifetime, such as authorship, pictorial language, wordplay, dualities and elements of chance achieved through the collaborative process.

Boetti first travelled to Afghanistan in 1971, where he became enamoured with the landscape and culture, and would spend much of the decade working and collaborating there. He commissioned his mosaic-like word grids and geopolitical maps to be embroidered by local Afghan craftswomen, first in Kabul, and following the Soviet invasion of 1979, in Peshawar, Pakistan, where many had taken refuge. Boetti would provide the blueprint for these works while he left the selection of colours and other chance interpretations and additions, such as the inclusion of Farsi text, up to the embroiderers.

Alternandosi e Dividendosi (Positivo-Negativo), 1988-89, resonates with vibrancy, its richly coloured letters translates to 'Alternating and Unveiling Oneself (Positive-Negative)', an apt aphorism for the nomadic artist whose work coalesced East and West and who endlessly explored concepts of identity and authorship.