Tattoo Clothing and Tie Dye
Batik is a method born in the Island of Java, Indonesia, for colouring cotton fabrics. This technique was included in the list of UNESCO’s “Intangible Cultural Heritage” in 2009 as an expression of knowledge and skills that a group recognizes as part of its cultural heritage.
The first findings of flax fragments come from Egypt and date back to the 4th century, they are bandages for mummies that were soaked in wax then scratched with a sharp stylus, dyed with a mixture of blood and ash were washed with hot water to eliminate the wax.
Woman applying wax on the textile.
Tattoo Clothing and Tie Dye
The Two Techniques and Two Sultanates
In Java two techniques were developed: the tulis and the tjap.
Tulis, literally means “writing” and consists in manually drawing on the fabric the shapes and patterns with the tjanting, a small copper tank with a spout curved downwards, and equipped with a small bamboo handle. It goes without saying that this technique produces unique pieces of great value.
The tjap technique (literally mold or stamp) makes use of metal molds on which the wax is applied (or similar materials), allowing a more economic diffusion of this particular art.
A thousand motifs are known, each with a specific name and meaning. Some drawings are reserved exclusively for the clothes of Javanese nobles and indicate their rank. On the day of the coronation the sultans wear a particular sarong painted with a specific batik design that even they are not allowed to wear on other occasions.
Stamp used in the “tjap” technique.
Tattoo Clothing and Tie Dye
For centuries the two main centres of batik art are the Djokja sultanate (batik with colder colours) and the sultanate of Solo (batik with warmer colours).
The technique consists in drawing with liquid wax on the white fabric, then dipping the canvas into a colouring bath. The warm water melts and remove the wax from the textile so that the drawing remains clear on the coloured background.
Once the wax pattern is finished on one side, it is repeated very faithfully on the reverse so that a fabric worked with batik, has neither straight nor backhand.
The wax is spread on the fabric by tjanting. Originally the fabric was covered with virgin wax made more viscous with the addition of tropical resin. Now instead of wax, a dose of paraffin is often mixed, in the proportion of 1 to 4.
Batik in Europe
The art of batik was exclusive to Javanese noblewomen. Around 1850 the art became bastardized becoming industry, thanks to the Europeans who introduced a mechanical process that disfigured and dried up art.
In the sec. XX the industry has taken a different form with the use of chemical colouring materials (anilines and risers). Processing with molds and with European became no longer a feminine industry but largely a male one.
Over the last few decades, even the European ladies, first in Holland, then in Germany and then in England, have begun to do batik work, but very rarely apply the Javanese technique in all its complicated originality. Often, in fact, their simplified techniques do not have much in common with the true batik. An excellent batik artist is Marina Elphick.
Among the wealthy people,genuine batik will always be sought after and appreciated, because it is inimitable. While at the courts of Djokja and Solo the future of an art that is so characteristic and even indispensable for reasons of worship and for court ceremonies, it seems well assured from tradition itself.
Red Acid Moon T-Shirts.
Tattoo Clothing Tie Dye
In the 60s we witness the birth of the Hippie movement with a clothing that reflected a disorderly and often vagabond lifestyle, characterized by ethnic clothes, in particular oriental. Clothes and t-shirts were then created with the tie-dye technique, a coarse method that resembled Indonesian batik, whose prints were random and psychedelic.
We really got inspired by all this movement and style that we created our own tie dye colletion mixed with our tattoo clothing brand. The all process gave birth to our Limited “Acid Moon” Collection.
We wanted to take something classic, made from people, and create our version of it. We acid washed the T-Shirt and put our Tattoo Design logo on the left procket of each tee.
Our T-Shirts Inspired by the Tie-dye with a Tattoo Design:
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