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Batik-Indonesia's copyright

Batik is both an art and a craft, which is becoming more popular and well known in the West as a wonderfully creative medium. The art of decorating cloth in this way, using wax and dye, has been practised for centuries. In Java, Indonesia, batik is part of an ancient tradition, and some of the finest batik cloth in the world is still made there. The word batik originates from the Javanese tik and means to dot.

To make a batik, selected areas of the cloth are blocked out by brushing or drawing hot wax over them, and the cloth is then dyed. The parts covered in wax resist the dye and remain the original colour. This process of waxing and dyeing can be repeated to create more elaborate and colourful designs. After the final dyeing the wax is removed and the cloth is ready for wearing or showing.

Contemporary batik, while owing much to the past, is markedly different from the more traditional and formal styles. For example, the artist may use etching, discharge dyeing, stencils, different tools for waxing and dyeing, wax recipes with different resist values and work with silk, cotton, wool, leather, paper or even wood and ceramics.

Batik is historically the most expressive and subtle of the resist methods. The ever widening range of techniques available offers the artist the opportunity to explore a unique process in a flexible and exciting way.

In Indonesia, some offices and schools state rules that every Friday Indonesians have to use Batik clothes. I love to wear Batik too. For me,Batik has unique patterns and is comfortable to wear.

Reog is a traditional Indonesian dance form. There are many types of Reogs in Indonesia, but the most notable ones are Reog Ponorogo (East Java) and Reog Sunda (West Java). Although both share a similar name, there is no connection nor similar theme among these traditions. Reog Ponorogo seems to be the kind of dance that demonstrate physical strength and extravagant lion-peafowl mask and costumes, while Reog Sunda is a lot more like a traditional musical comedy and dance.

Here is a video of Reog Ponorogo..

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Plastic Bottle Building in Taiwan

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1.5 Million Bottles Used to Build It!
A building some are calling "the world's first plastic bottle built structure" has been unveiled in Taiwan. This amazing building, dubbed the EcoARK, was constructed using a whopping 1.5 million PET bottles to raise awareness about the importance of recycling. Standing three-stories tall, the EcoARK features an amphitheater, an exhibition hall, and a screen of falling water collected during rainy periods for use as air conditioning. The designers tout the building as being "the world's lightest, movable, breathable environmental miracle," yet insist it's strong enough to handle typhoons and earthquakes--but it's sure have recycling enthusiasts blown away.According toThe China Post, the EcoARK was commissioned three years ago by the Taiwan-based Far Eastern Group at a price tag of around US$3 million, based on the three goals of "Reduce, Reuse and Recycle." The company will donate the green structure to the city next month, where it will be use as exhibition hall during the 2010 Taipei Int'l Flora Expo in November.

When asked what inspired the monument to recycling, developer Arthur Huang says it was found, well, in the trash:

When we are thinking about what type of trash to make a very, very green low carbon building, we just look at our trash can, and we noticed that in our office, most of our trash that we have are actually PET bottles, because all our engineers love drinking bottled tea.

The EcoARK, and the call for better waste management that it represents, couldn't have come at a better time in Taiwan. It is estimated that only a mere 4 percent of the nation's plastic bottles are recycled or reused--and with 2.4 billion bottles used annually, that adds up to a lot of waste to clutter landfills, or worse, make it out to sea.

A report from New Tang Dynasty Televison offers a peek inside.

What makes the EcoARK so impressive, aside from its low carbon footprint and masterful use of recycled bottles as building material, is its purely aesthetic beauty. It just goes to show that there are no limits to what can be created when you look hard enough at a problem...or deep enough in a trash can.

Creative decorations for the upcoming Chinese New Year :)

If you don't know what decorations that are right for your home for Chinese New Year, you should try making this dragon. You can make it with your family to have a quality time with them :)

Egg Box Chinese Dragon

Isn't this Chinese dragon magnificent! The kids can make him with egg boxes and other scraps from the craft cupboard, and he will be a fantastic part of your Chinese New Year study or celebrations.

You will need:

2 Egg boxes
Paint
coloured paper
Glue
Tissue paper
Pens
Stapler

Instructions:

Paint the egg boxes in brightly coloured paint. When the paint is dry, cut out two of the egg compartments from one of the boxes and glue these to the lid of the other egg box the form the eyes (see the photo below).

Cut a mane, eyes, nose, mouth and other decorations from coloured paper. Glue these on to your dragon’s head.

Draw some scales on the tissue paper. Finally staple the tissue paper to the back of the head to form the tail of your dragon.

Carved Book Landscapes by Guy Laramee

(click images for detail)

For the better part of three decades multidisciplinary artist Guy Laramee has worked as a stage writer, director, composer, a fabricator of musical instruments, a singer, sculptor, painter and writer. Among his sculptural works are two incredible series of carved book landscapes and structures entitled Biblios and The Great Wall, where the dense pages of old books are excavated to reveal serene mountains, plateaus, and ancient structures. Of these works he says:

So I carve landscapes out of books and I paint Romantic landscapes. Mountains of disused knowledge return to what they really are: mountains. They erode a bit more and they become hills. Then they flatten and become fields where apparently nothing is happening. Piles of obsolete encyclopedias return to that which does not need to say anything, that which simply IS. Fogs and clouds erase everything we know, everything we think we are.

Laramee’s next show will be in April of 2012 at the Galerie d’Art d’Outremont in Montreal. (via kastormag)