Sri Lanka is full of life and colour, and it is imparted in some of the native clothing styles as those of Batiks. Batik is a medium that lies somewhere between art and craft, and is believed to be at least 2000 years old; an art brought forth from Indonesia.
The Sri Lankan Batik is a colourful fabric with dramatic designs that shows the Sri Lankan tradition textiles and designs. Men and women from different areas in Sri Lanka make Batiks as their main source of living.
People from other countries love the unique design that the Sri Lankan use and put into their decorative local items.
Process of Batik Painting
To make a batik painting one should seek patience. It is long process but worthwhile. The time you devote on making a motif on cloth and then dying it makes it more attractive. The impressive art form starts with:
a) Waxing
The dyers first wash the cotton cloth on which they wish to paint. The cloth is washed in order de starch it. When the starch is removed from the cloth, it is then dried, ironed and stretched on a wooden frame to paint. Some people make a rough sketch of charcoal to have a basic idea of the motif to be drawn and painted. The sketched design becomes explicit by and by as the coats of waxing are applied to the cloth.
Then comes the most important part, which is time consuming. The wax is applied to the cloth and used a protective agent while dyeing the fabric. This has to be done with much care. The painter uses a special pen to apply wax and the wax ink.
b) Dyeing
After this process, the dyers use colours to paint that area. Once this is done, the cloth is gently washed with a special liquid and later it is washed by lukewarm water. To get that perfect design the dyers often have to make redundancy of the procedure of waxing, dyeing and de waxing. Generally this process is carried out starting with light colours and then moving on to the darker shades.
c) De-waxing
After the dyers completes the colouring process; the cloth is washed in boiling water. To remove all the wax from the fabric this process can be repeated. If the cloth is very big, then the cloth is removed from the frame and later dipped in a dye basin.
In the final stage, the cloth is rinsed in cold water and the paintings are dipped in a solution of sulphuric acid. This process fastens the colour on the fabric. This form of art is remarkable for its quality of being three dimensional giving it depth and the texture of the fabric looks very gorgeous.
