What in the world will we be doing today?
We will start off by learning about what batik is, where it comes from and what tools are used to make it. After learning a little bit about the history of batik we will look at how different current artists use a variety of techniques in the application, color mediums and surfaces to get different effects. Everyone will make their own tool (Canting/Tjanting) that can be used right away! Before we start the art making we will all safely heat our wax together (I will walk everyone through the process.) Starting off we will test the waters (or wax!) and make sure it penetrates the fibers so final pieces do not get ruined. After doing a tester piece successfully the fun can begin! Batik lends itself easily to patterns, so I feel creating patterns would be a good introduction to this art form. Think about inspiration from your surroundings and what you see in your day to day life (leaves? pets? television? air looms?) We will have a block of time to create before we share our in progress works with each other! Lastly we will close out with a demo on how to clean wax off of your metal bowl and how to remove the wax from your cloth!
Materials
– The package that I sent (this contains wax and materials to make a Kistka)
– 4 popsicle sticks
– Circle of aluminum
– Thin wire
– Sand paper
– Bees wax
– Paraffin wax
– A double boiler (stove/hotplate, pot and metal bowl)
– A way to tighten your clothe (embroidery hook or upside down chair with ties)
– Cloth (cotton or silk works best)
– Cheap paint brushes
– Paper
– Charcoal
– Scissors
– Strong glue or tape
– Safety and protective supplies (sunglasses, gloves, tablecloth, apron/clothes you don’t mind getting dirty)
Resources (for further learning)
Tutorials (video and written)
Earth Guild Batik – Written
Make a Kistka for Wax Resist Egg Dyeing! – Written
The Batik Guild – Written
The Step by Step Process of Making Batik – Written
How to Melt Wax Safely – Video
How to Clean Wax out of Pots – Video
The Quickening Image – Written
Preview of slides
Daniel Gabriel Angelo Jean-Baptiste is an African and dutch artist living in the Caribbean island. He creates art based off of his environment, celebrating where he lives and capturing the beautiful animal/sea life that surrounds him. He uses the special technique of painting wet on wet to create delicate hues.
Adam de Boer is a first generation american living in california. He uses Batik in his work to explore his Eurasian (Dutch-Indonesian) heritage. His work is about the push and pull of two cultural identities. He works in batik (as well as woodcarving and leather work) and pushes the medium so it no longer is traditional, in conversation with his thoughts on his hybrid identity. He also uses material (Like tile) to interwork ideas of colonization and uses traditional techniques to push meaning.
Leo Twiggs is an african american artist born in the segregated south. He began teaching at South Carolina State university in 1964, the same time he started to work with Batik. He would make art using symbols of hate and using the process of Batik make them look old and decayed, making a statement of how these events/dark chapters of the south need to pass and decay in totality.
David Dodge Lewis is an american artist born in Maine. He started to use Paraffin wax on large scale drawings in the 1980’s. He uses the technique with both dry and wet mediums (charcoal, ink wash and charcoal wash)
http://www.lcva.longwood.edu/exhibitions/quickening-image-wax-resist-drawings-david-dodge-lewis-ephraim-rubenstein-twenty-year https://ephraimrubenstein.com/wp-content/uploads/The-Quickening-Image-Magazine-Copy.compressed.pdf
More in depth Timeline of Workshop
Introduce what it is. Talk about where it comes from and the tools used to make it. (5 minutes)
Talk about technique through artists. Summarize the different ways to use each tool and dye. (10 minutes)
Can either dip or paint
Can either use Tjanting or brush
Can use different surfaces (clothe, wood, paper, etc.)
Run workshop on how to make tool – Talk about safety (10 minutes)
Run workshop on how to warm up wax – Talk about safety and demonstrate making on top of a drawing (10 minutes)
Ask everyone to make one tester clothe with a dot of wax on it and soak it in dye. While the tester piece sits in the dye give prompt (10 minutes)
Prompt: Pick something in your environment that you are drawn to (or in your day to day life), it can be something that has meaning or something that draws you in authentically. Take a closer look and base a pattern off of it. (for scaffolding you can have students do texture rubbing by putting paper over a surface and rubbing charcoal on the paper to expose a pattern/texture.) Incorporate the pattern into the design of the cloth (You can do full pattern or incorporate it into an illustrative piece.)
Independent work for half hour (30 minutes)
Check back in and invite students to share the object they based their pattern off of and show any sketches or progress they made (if cloth isn’t in dyeing process) (5-10 minutes)
talk about how they will take the wax out at the end/how to get wax out of the pot (5 minutes)
Either boil or iron
This will have to be done later on when the dye is set and the cloth has dried.
Videos of Daniel Gabriel Angelo Jean-Baptiste working (Good for inspirational background music and visuals while creating)
He has his own channel with lots of content, check it out for relaxing process videos! https://www.youtube.com/c/DanielJeanBaptiste/videos