Tie-dye & Tritik
 |
Tie-dye is an ancient resist-dye technique found in South Sumatra, Java, Bali, Sulawesi and South Kalimantan. Like many other textile techniques found in Indonesia, tie dye was probably introduced by Indian traders who brought Indian tie-dyed fabrics ("bandhani") to the region. The generic Malay-Indonesian name for this technique is "pelangi" meaning rainbow. A related method of tying and dyeing is called "tritik" in which the resist-dye pattern is stitched into the cloth with needle and thread. The East Indies Museum has many examples of tie-dyed textiles, particularly from South Sumatra and Bali. The collection also includes some very fine examples of the tritik technique found on some Central Javanese court textiles known as "kemben". Finally, the collection features some rare 6-meter tritik waist-wraps ("bengkung Jawa") in rich, natural-dye reds that were worn by Javanese and Chinese-Peranakan women for binding the mid-section during the traditional 44-day postpartum confinement period.
