Batik - From the Courts of Java and Sumatra
Batik occupies a special position in Indonesia's history and culture. The extraordinary photographs of cloths and prints in this book demonstrate why batik is the stuff of textile legend. These 71 batik designs, taken from the collection of famed dealer Rudolf G. Smend, date from 1880-1930, a time still considered batik's golden age. There are also 16 vintage prints from the Leo Haks collection, which demonstrate how batik was worn at court and in other settings.
Rudolf G. Smend is a passionate batik collector and owner of Galerie Smend in Cologne, Germany. Brigitte Khan Majlis is Curator of Textiles at the Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum of Ethnology in Cologne.