For two hundred and seventy odd years it has been known in Holland, to which country it was brought by the Dutch traders from Java in the middle of the seventeenth century. It was not, however, received very enthusiastically and the commercial failure that followed the importation of some 2000 pieces (which were finally sold at auction, as no market could be found for them through regular channels) did not encourage traders in their efforts to popularize batiks. From that time, that is, about 1750 until 1817, interest in the work decidedly flagged and the honour of reviving it must be given primarily to Raffles who gave a description of it in his well known “History of Java” published at the latter date. He, however, seems to have had very little personal feeling for the art and merely wrote it up as a matter of history, and it remained for the modern artists to give it is first real impetus.
DUTCH ARTISTS OF FAME
The present keen interest in the craft is mainly due to Chris Lebeau, Dijesselhof and Lion Cachet, who have, by their wonderful work, revived and stimulated a nation-wide appreciation of the art.
American batik has recently gone through a phase of development similar to that experienced in Holland some twelve years ago. It has been in danger of getting into the class of transient “cults” and becoming a fashionable pastime with a rise and fall similar to the craze for doing peasant wood-carving, burnt-wood work or sweater knitting. But here, too, its real merit has saved it from becoming just a modish amusement. In Holland it was even introduced into girls’ schools as a regular course, so that graduates might enter the social world fully equipped! Luckily for its ultimate survival, however, it required so much technical knowledge that it was soon left to serious students, but the desire for the beautiful results obtained by the process was not relinquished so willingly and the result was that people tried to produce the effect without the work. This imitation was called a “secret process” and enjoyed considerable vogue.
The general public believed that this substitute was real batik, because the material had been dipped and some wax had been used, but any one who knew anything about the genuine process, was not fooled and recognized that stencils and various other fake methods had been utilized. The unlimited patience of the native worker was unknown, and unsung was the thoroughness of the painstaking craftsman. At this period the watch-word was “speed” and the results showed it.
CONVENTIONAL FISH DESIGN BY CHRIS LEBEAU
The importance placed on the “crackle effect” is another parallel in the phases of development in Holland and America. Crackle certainly has its place in the beauty of batik, but the indiscriminate use of it as a complete motive of decoration in itself, is to be regretted. It would be used less, probably, if examples of the best native and European work were studied, in which real design and colour are the arresting features.
Even whilst admitting that the medium does limit the designer to a certain extent, study of the work of the before-mentioned Dutchmen, Dijesselhof and Lebeau, will show the variety of design, feeling and temperament that can be expressed through the batik process.
DIJESSELHOF