Smocked pencil skirt

This pencil skirt shows the badan, the body, the 'durien pecah' motif. Although there is a striking resemblance to the Javanese garuda wings (lar), the origin of this motif in Jambi sought in imported cloth from India or Persia. The association with the durian fruit therefore refers to fertility and not to a Hindu myth. (2001, Kerlogue, pg. 87) The rest of the diamond consists of floral motifs and tendrils. Around it are symmetrically arranged flowers with a buta in the corners of the cloth, also from India.‖ The motifs on the cloth are applied in the batik technique. Until the batiked cloth, 347-2, was donated to the Colonial Institute in 1927 by Tassilo Adam, it was unknown in the Netherlands that the batik technique was also used in Jambi in Sumatra. B.M. Goslings, at the time curator at the Colonial Institute, became fascinated by this cloth and decided to research it. Goslings contacted local colonial officials and nine more canvases (all blue) were sent to him. \From information supplied by Tassilo Adam, it appeared that not only patched cloth dyed with indigo was produced in Jambi, but also cloth with both blue and red motifs. Although this was confirmed in Jambi, researchers in the Netherlands believed that the cloths with red paint could not originate from Jambi. Until 1930, Professor J.C. van Eerde, director of the Ethnology department of the Colonial Institute, brought back a 'red' Jambi cloth from a study trip. \In the collection there are also cloths, collected in Jambi, with motifs applied in other than the batik technique, such as mordant printing. These canvases were probably made in India or in Europe for the Sumatran market after examples from Jambi. (Kerlogue, pg. 84 in Van Hout 'Batik - Drawn in Wax')