Chapter I: Front Matter

BATIK AND OTHER
PATTERN DYEING

BY
WALTER DAVIS BAKER
AND
IDA STRAWN BAKER

OF
THE WALDCRAFT STUDIOS
INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA

[Decoration]

1920
ATKINSON, MENTZER & COMPANY
CHICAGO

COPYRIGHT 1920 BY
ATKINSON, MENTZER & COMPANY

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

THE CONTENTS

I
History and Character of Batiks 11

II
The Principles of Dyeing Fabrics 35

III
Wax Resist Processes 54

IV
Batiks and Other Illuminated Textiles 75

V
Dyeing for Plays and Pageants 97

VI
Tie-Dyed Work 109

VII
Stick Printing, Block Printing and Stencil Dyeing 123

THE PREFACE

One of the hopeful observations during the few years of applied art education in our schools has been the readiness with which educators have taken up and kept problems in which the mediums of expression were practical and efficient, suitable for the purpose intended, and the equal readiness with which they have dropped other problems.

The burning of wood as a means of decoration did not stand this test, therefore it had to go. Oil paint is not a suitable medium to decorate textiles, therefore it too has nearly fallen from use.

The value of applied art to home and community rests upon the test, whether the pupil who works out the problems becomes by virtue thereof a more useful and cultured individual in the home and in the social and industrial life of the community.

A problem which satisfies this test becomes a basic problem. To a pupil who has once bound a book with its cover design, end papers, etc., a book is a different thing ever after. He becomes a more intelligent and cultured member of the consuming public so far as books are concerned. To the demands of many such members the book binders respond with better things. Therefore book binding is a basic problem.

Similar reasoning applies when a student weaves a fabric, plans and makes an article of dress, a toy, a silver ring, or a poster.

No one will dispute that the all-over dyeing of a fabric, and the decoration of a textile with a dyed pattern, are basic problems. The recent war brought home the vital place that dyes hold in the life of the people.

As suitable materials have become available teachers have been eager to learn and use these problems.

It is seldom that an applied problem comes to the art teacher that offers in so full a measure the essential features of a basic problem as does batik work, which involves both all-over and pattern dyeing.

The mechanical process is rather simple and offers no especial difficulty, requiring only the painstaking care that good teachers exact from pupils.

The design element involved may be simple or elaborate, fitted to the capacity of the pupil. It is a real problem in design, however, allowing great freedom yet carrying with it the discipline of a later test, viz., applied expression within the limitations of definite mediums.

As the process controls the entire surface, the pupil is directed to plan his design and ground areas both in space and color relations. The mediums used are fabrics and dyes, both inseparably involved in education as they are in life. The pupil must plan for the use intended and also for the particular type of individual or scheme of decoration.

The work carries with it all along the anticipation of results; and the beautiful finished piece is the reward of effort. What more could be desired in an applied school problem?

The endeavor and the hope in presenting this little book on "Batik and Other Pattern Dyeing" is to help those who are learning to undertake these problems with breadth of thought and efficiency of method.

THE AUTHORS.

Indianapolis, Indiana.

THE ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors are pleased to express grateful indebtedness to a number of friends in Indianapolis.

To Miss Roda E. Selleck, Shortridge High School, for her advanced high school projects in the development and application of batik designs; also in the application of tie-dyeing and blown stenciling.

To Miss Carolyn S. Ashbrook, Shortridge High School, for her projects with an elementary high school class.

To Miss Olive Rush, who designed and executed "The Capture" for the frontispiece.

To Miss Blanche Stillson for assistance in illustrating the wax resist processes; also for her designs, the blouse, page 80, and the pattern, page 87.

To Mr. Charles E. Rush, Librarian of the Public Library, for securing valuable publications of the Dutch Government.

To Mr. George Somnes, Director of The Little Theater, and Mrs. Eugene Fife, Little Theater, for their work revealed in Chapter V.

For the loan of old textiles, Miss Eliza Niblack, Curator of Textiles, John Herron Art Institute, the sarong, page 76, and the chundri, page 110; Mrs. Clifton A. Wheeler, the Javanese patterns, page 95; Mrs. William O. Bates, the sarong design used for the end papers; Miss Florence Fitch, Director of Art, Public Schools, the Indian block printing, page 126.

For permission to photograph their own handicraft, Miss Mary Overbeck (Cambridge City, Ind.) the tie-dyed patterns, pages 113 and 115; Mrs. James Thompson, the costume jewelry, page 78, and the tie-dyed scarf, page 115; Mrs. J. R. Brant, the blouse, page 82; Miss Mary Janet O'Reilly, the camisole, page 78.

Now what I want to do is to put definitely before you a cause
for which to strive. That cause is the Democracy of Art, the
ennobling of daily and common work, which will one day put hope
and pleasure in the place of fear and pain as the forces which
move men to labor and keep the world a-going.

·····William Morris