KERAMIC STUDIO 
lems of chemistry, and the lack of proper dyes was at first 
a great obstacle to the spreading of the batik industry in 
the Netherlands. 
The first practical assistance came from the Manager 
of the Division of Chemistry of the Colonial Museum of 
Harlem, who realized that this institution, with a labora- 
tory of its own, was in a position to solve, scientifically 
and practically, the problem of developing non-fading 
dyes suitable to use in our country, as • the East Indian 
dyes could not very well be used in Holland. 
At that time the publication of a richly illustrated 
monograph on the Art of Batiking in the East Indies had 
aroused much interest in the technique of the craft. An 
extensive investigation into the process was then begun 
in the laboratory of the Harlem Museum. Much time 
and care were spent in the research for dye recipes answer- 
ing the following requirements : 
i . They should be easily applicable. 
2. It should be possible to apply them cold, the wax 
melting at a temperature of 6o° C. 
3. The colors obtained should be sufficiently fast to 
be proof against injury caused by the removal of the wax 
by boiling out or by petroleum-ether. 
4. The colors should be non-fading. 
The investigation was also extended to the prepara- 
tion of a wax mixture (usually wax with resin, sometimes 
wax with mastic, also paraffine with lard) which would be 
best suited to batiking, would not scale off, nor get too 
hard, so as to prevent frequent cracking, and would be 
proof against the influence of the chemicals which fix the 
dyes in the textile. 
This was the origin of the Harlem Batiking technique, 
first worked out in the laboratory, and since then so widely 
known that a great many people, abroad as well as at home, 
are using it in their work. 
Speaking of batik, Walter Crane wrote : "It was very 
interesting to note the revival and modern application of 
the old Javanese method of dyeing patterns upon textiles, 
in which use is made of wax to stop out the plain parts. 
This method has been revived by the Dutch and applied 
to hangings of various materials, often with remarkable 
effects." 
The use of aniline dyes has been abandoned for the 
present at Harlem, not only for the reasons stated above, 
but because these dyes often give an unpleasantly bright 
color. Such is not the case with vegetable dyes, which, 
formerly used in European dyeing establishments, and 
applied with fine effect by the Eastern people, are the 
natural dyes for batiking. 
Batiking itself, the designing in wax, is almost ex- 
clusively done with the Javanese tjantings, small wax 
vessels with spouts. 
TJANTING 
Tjanting Pengarda (two-thirds actual size) 
Before describing the experiments made in the Harlem 
laboratory, I will give a short account of my own exper- 
ience in batiking, and, for the sake of thoroughness, I 
Dutch batik on a silkpillow. 
wish to state that I was among those who started by ex- 
perimenting, without any help, with the dyeing of parch- 
ment. It so happened that it took me a year to experi- 
ment with a blue dye alone. I indeed knew that indigo 
was used for this purpose, but the difficulty lay in the fact 
that the color was to be prepared so as to be non-fading 
and fast, and, so to speak, to become one with the parch- 
ment. Considering that parchment is a rather expensive 
material, the reader will realize that these experiments 
were costly, but at last I found a very simple indigo bath, 
answering all requirements, and composed as follows : 
Blue dye — Rub the indigo to a very fine powder and 
mix it with green vitriol, until it becomes a thick paste. 
Let it stand at least two days, then mix it with one part 
green vitriol and five parts water. With this color the 
parchment is dyed as many times as is needed to give it 
the desired intensity of color. 
Red dye — One gramme of carmine and fifteen grammes 
of spirits of ammonia. Bet the dye stand one day before 
using. 
Yellow and brown dye — Make a saturated solution of 
bichromate of potash in water, and steep the parchment 
in it. The latter is then exposed to the air for a day. A 
beautiful brown is the result. Heat the water to 6o° C. 
Dark brown and black dye — Make a saturated solution 
of sulphate of iron in water, heated to 6o° C, and steep in 
this bath the spots that have first been dyed red. This 
will give an especially fine, deep brown, sometimes almost 
black. 
These colors on parchment are astonishingly rich and 
of unsurpassed brilliancy. In my opinion, there is no 
material, which, when dyed, produces such a magnificent 
effect as parchment, and for this reason I spared no trouble 
in perfecting my experiments. The genuine animal parch- 
ment cannot be decorated, logically and well, in any other 
way. Printed colors can be scratched off, and gold wears 
off, but these mordant dyes permeate the parchment and 
become one with it. 
The parchment is stretched on a sheet of glass, as 
designers stretch their paper on a drawing board, by gum- 
ming the edges. Just like the paper, the parchment is 
first moistened, then the design is pasted to the back. The 
sheet of glass is then placed at an angle of 45 against a 
