Smocked pencil skirt

The kepala ('head') of this pencil skirt contains a number of flower bouquets, white on red, including carnations. Furthermore butterflies, birds on a branch and small flowers. The badan ('body') contains the tambalan-motif, a kind of patchwork motif of squares divided into four triangles, which are filled with different motifs, such as ayam puger (chicken, bird in a bowl), fish, parang, lar, flowers etc. Ayam puger is a traditional Javanese motif that was worn by virgins just before the separation period before marriage (Heringa, 1996:206). The parang motif is one of the so-called forbidden motifs. These motifs were forbidden to ordinary citizens by the sultans of Yogya and Solo. Parang means (small) sword, and symbolizes power and growth (McCabe Elliot, 1984:68). The lar refers to garuda, the sacred riding animal of the Hindu god Vishnu, and ancient royal symbol (idem; Heringa, 1996:171; van Roojen, 1998:69-73). \Tambal was also a motif with magical and ceremonial functions, at least in Central Java. North coast tambals, like this one, were normally decorative rather than symbolic, and in these batiks the places of origin are clearly recognizable. For example, Pekalongan tambalan are identified by bright colors and detailed filled-in background patterns (McCabe Elliot, 1984:98).‖ In the period between 1870-1880, the European community doubled in Java, with the proportion of European women increasing. This had noticeable effects on batik designs. One of the most influential batiksters was Lien Metzelaar (born: the Stoop). She began her batik workshop in 1880 and worked through to 1919. Mr. Metzelaar, government official, died relatively young, leaving Lien with four children and a small allowance. As an extra income she designed batiks for sale. An Arab trader brought these products to Batavia, and lent Mrs Metzelaar money so she could take on batik artists. Many of her batiks ended up in the Netherlands. \Initially she signed her work with L.Metzelaar Pekalongan, but later changed this to L. Metz Pek. Her influence on the changes in batik motifs was great. It was she who began to depict only a (simple) flower 'bouquet' in the kepala. The use of dotted diagonal lines as a filler motif is attributed to her. Another characteristic is the use of an embryo bird in the kepala. Even on the old hand-printed imitation batiks from the cotton printing factory of Fentener van Vlissingen in Helmond, these characteristics recur (Veldhuisen, 1993:76-79).\This cloth is depicted in Veldhuisen's Batik Belanda (1993:77).\Formaturing a pencil skirt with motifs applied in the batik technique. Batik is a textile decoration technique, called a reserve technique, in which hot wax is applied in patterns to a cloth with a wax pen (canting) or with a copper stamp (cap). The cloth is dipped in a dye bath so that no dye can penetrate the covered parts and that part remains unpainted after the wax is removed. When a cloth is desired in several colours, this process is repeated.