My 'Batik Painting' Day!

Did lots of interesting stuff this past weekend.  Painted  myself a batik tshirt, started a knitting project and went on a short 2d/1n makan trip to Ipoh.  Superwoman... haha... But I gonna just blog about our fun-filled afternoon painting batik this time round.  Knitting & Ipoh will come in another entry.

This is where it all took place - Jadi Batek, located along Jalan Inai, somewhere behind Imbi.

Before we start off with our own creations, we were first taken around it's workshop for a short tour.  Colin, the owner, showed us how each pieces of the beautiful batiks were made. 

Long fabrics were stretched across the room on wooden frames before the designs were outlined on with an equipment called "canting" which is filled with hot melted wax.  In fact, this "canting" thing look something like a smoking pipe....hehehe

The colouring part will only come after the 'canting' part.  Purpose of the wax outline is to ensure that the colour stays within where it is intended for and not smear out to other parts.  Eg, red colours should remain on the flower's petals and not smear out to it's leafs.  Like that la...

Actually, this is not my first time to batik painting.  My first exposure was when I was 14 years old I think.  How it happened was, I remembered I was very angry and agitated cause I do not know how to paint a stupid batik artwork which is part of our art class in school and which I need to submit to a very strict art teacher at school.  After brooding over it for couple of days, my mom came up with this bright idea.  She said, "Why not go ask so and so and see if he can teach you?". This so-and-so (I can't remember his name... Mansor? Syah?) is a friend of my mom who owns a batik workshop near my mom's stall.  An image of an average Malay man with sarong and songkok must have pops up in your mind when I said he owns a batik workshop.  But I tell you, this man, look anything but an average Malay man in sarong and songkok.  Lols.... He has long curly hair like those of a rocker, kept a moustache, wore funky fitting tshirt with skinny jeans, Rayban sunglasses and speaks good English.... More like a Mat Rock than a Mat Batik... hehehe.... 

He got one of his Batik Artist to sit with me and explained how a Batik was done.  And that, was my first experience meddling with canting and fat brushes. I still remember what I said to my mom after my first lesson.  I said.. "I dont know whether to call her Kak or Bang...so I just kept quiet throughout... :p"  cause she is a he.  Mom said... "Then mah call Kakbang lor..." *faint*  lols....

Anyway, enough of 'Hari Ini Dalam Sejarah' (Today in history).  Going on... 

After the short tour, we gained some understanding on how it was being done and so we start off with ours. 

Since our lots are not much of the artistic kind, instead of creating our own design/motifs, we sieved thru the many designs they have and pick out the one we fancy most.

Some of us painted on tshirts, some on silk scarfs and some on hankerchiefs.  They are all laid out on the table for us when we arrived.

Again, since our lots are still long way from being an 'expert', we started off with tracing our selected design onto our piece with a pencil instead of drawing freehand with a canting like how the experts does it.

Only then, we traced the pencil's outline with 'canting'.  Here, like how Terri put it, the expert is doing damage control to my piece. :p  Making sure there is not breaking lines. 

What come next was the colouring part.  Seriously, it was not as easy as it sound.  Painting on fabrics does require different technique.  But once you get a hang of it, it is easy peasy once again :)

Me having a great time play colouring...lols... Then a friend aimed a camera at me and I warned her to make sure it was my pretty side.  Lols...... We all had a good laugh.  It was nothing... saja only...

The many different colour dye that was prepared for us.  Green, red, blue, magenta, yellow & etc....  But I think the brushes they provided us was those they rejected.  Cause some were pretty coarse like over used already.  Pretty difficult to colour within the lines.  Evie's brush was worst.  According to her, her brush were like overload with MSG (ajinamoto) cause the hair kept falling off... hahaha....  See la... how not to laugh when we have all crazy people like this together in the same room?  It was already a feat to hold the brush steady ok....

And this is Evie, our friend who took it upon herself to organise this fun outing for us all... 

"Thanks Evie, I had a great time and so are the rest I am sure!"

Hot wax boiling amidst the many brushes and colourful dyes.  This is the wax that will be filled in the 'canting' to draw the outline.

Took 5 to spy and laugh at each other's masterpieces.

"Why like that one???"

"Why you gecko that colour one?"

"Why got colour outside one??"

And we concluded that we definately need to keep our day job.  :p

This orange flower on the left is the creation of Evie. :)  Not too bad eh?

Little kid also can do it.  By the way, he did a pretty good job ok.  Only realised it was painted by a kid when I look thru Evie's photos.  When I first saw the finished piece, I thought it was done by an adult.  Very nice.

This one here, the gecko, belongs to Terri.  Seriously nice lor after the damage control.

And here, I present you, my work of art.  =)  Honestly, I think I got potential lor...lols *perasan*  I think my piece turned out quite alright.  Picture below shown how it look after being treated (meaning, removing the wax outline). 

All of us had so much fun at Jadi Batek and cant wait for another session soon! :)