Textiles

Indonesia’s new generation of textile designers is putting a modern twist on the ancient art of batik

Reinventing tradition is never easy. However, a new generation of Indonesians is putting a modern twist on the ancient craft of batik, incorporating traditional methods into contemporary designs for luxury fashion, accessories and furnishings.

This renaissance is propelled by two seemingly opposite trends. First, there is a growing desire both at home and abroad for authenticity and for beautiful handmade products rooted in a rich national heritage. At the same time, a modern online global market has emerged, enabling innovative designers to promote and sell their works further afield.

‘I think many young designers are actively looking for new ideas to integrate tradition with what’s relevant to them today,’ says Jakarta-based fashion designer Emmelyn Gunawan, whose sustainable homewares emporium Canaan in Bali showcases batik fabric with whimsical, natural motifs resembling flower blossoms and artful abstract patterns. Each one-of-a-kind piece is made by hand using non-toxic dyes.

Gunawan grew up in Melbourne, Australia, where she studied fashion design before returning to Indonesia to open contemporary fashion store Escalier in Bali; she says she thinks of batik as a process rather than a product. The traditional method involves applying melted wax onto parts of the textiles before dyeing, with the dye not penetrating those parts and the final design only revealed after the hardened wax is removed.

‘For me, it’s always important to look deeper into the process of making things,’ says Gunawan. ‘Perhaps I have this curiosity because my background is in fashion and textile design; I always ask myself who is making the batik, where are they from and why are they making them.’

For stylist and fashion designer Chitra Subyakto, the inspiration to create her own batik came while working as a stylist at teen magazine Cosmogirl in 2001. Surprised by how difficult it was to find designs with an Indonesian touch, Subyakto took matters into her own hands, producing her signature easyto-wear batik in soft, modern textiles.

Now creative director of Sejauh Mata Memandang, the Jakarta-based batik fashion house that she founded in 2014, Subyakto designs traditional sarongs or kain, other items of clothing, and scarves and shawls whose designs are inspired by Indonesia’s wet and dry seasons. She also creates bags, accessories and homewares. Patterns and colours are drawn from nature: the Algae collection reflects the hues of Indonesia’s seaweed farms and fishermen’s boats, while the Noodle Bowl collection depicts a rooster and a flower. The designs reflect what she likes to wear in a tropical climate, she explains. ‘They’re honest, simple designs. The looks are trendless and timeless.’

Subyakto also utilises batik for her work in commercials and films. Her film Athirah, which is based on the life of Indonesian Vice President Jusuf Kalla’s mother, incorporates a wardrobe of vintage sarongs from Sulawesi — some from her own collection and several she made herself.

’If I give it time, shapes will come to me that become patterns in what we produce and wear

in Sejauh. The same images will reappear, whether they’re landscapes, colours and lines, or things. I trust in their reappearance in my travels, in the people I meet, in little and big things, all the things that make me think of home, this street, this city, this country. Their beauty is simple and timeless,’ Subyakto explains.

Esayuri Harsono is another Indonesian fashion designer exploring batik in innovative ways. In 2009, after graduating from Columbus College of Art & Design in Ohio, she launched her fashion label Esayuri with a colourful collection of batik garments that found an immediate market in demanding young Indonesians and the international fashion-conscious.

According to Harsono, younger generations are reluctant to wear batik because it is seen as very formal and old-fashioned. Most, she notes, prefer a ‘Westernised style to look cool and up-to-date’. ‘It’s a struggle to overcome perceptions of what batik should be and to create our own definition while remaining loyal to its traditional roots,’ she says.

Her solution was to update the concept of batik, incorporating it in her fabrics, couture and ready-to-wear collections. Harsono’s modern home decor collection also uses batik and other ancestral crafts such as ikat, in which, unlike batik, yarn is dyed before weaving.

For Harsono, supporting ancestral craft is simply part of celebrating design. ‘Good design shouldn’t forget our past — it should value our heritage and work with our current lives to create a better future,’ she says. ‘I hope batik continues to be a part of our national culture as a celebrated, timeless art that will be inherited by the generations to come.’

Contemporary batik designs by Chitra Subyakto of Sejauh Mata Memandang (top) and Emmelyn Gunawan of Canaan (bottom)