Javanese Batik Wood Art

Java. With a lifestyle culture that looked unique even in a short first glimpse.

I visited Yogyakarta / Borobudur a few years ago. And in the short stop at stores, found these pieces of an art form that I had not seen before – Batik on Wood!

Batik is a wax-resist dyeing process in which the patterns are created by covering up the portions that do not need the dye with hot wax.

Batik is not new to me as it is popular in India as well. But I had only seen it done on cloth. Seeing the finesse of the work of Javanese Batik I realised that there are very different levels at which one can create Batik art on cloth.  Will write about that later.

But the Batik on wood was a fascinating new subject! And so among a few other things, with limited baggage space I picked up a few pieces that I still find beautiful.

Here they are:

BOWLS

FIGURES

[I had also brought back this man’s wife but she is lost somewhere in a pile of textiles]

SMALL WOODEN PIECES [ENVELOPE OPENERS?]

There is no limit to human imagination!! And it might take a lifetime just to even see once, all the possible art forms that have been created by man over the centuries!!

Here is a link to another blogger’s coverage of the process.

jm

Jan 2015