Dear all,
As you can tell, I have been waiting to find out what ikat I got into my hands for almost seven months now. But suddenly some days ago while I visited the online archives of Klefisch auction house to look for some Raijua cloth that I knew they sold years ago, I decided to browse around through the menu to see what else they had sold in their glory years, and saw that they had also handled Palué ikat. As I had in vain tried to get one for the last year, I took a peek to see what they sold back then, and received a jolt when I noticed patterns very similar to those on my mystery cloth (and those on Georges Breguet's). Now while Klefisch (unfortunately now defunct, but archives fortunately kept online by Van Ham) had a deserved reputation for being thorough, I was hesitant with jubilation. They might of course have gotten the piece wrong. So I then did a wider search for images of Palué sarongs. And sure enough I did find two more that confirmed the Klefisch designation of origin. I show them in order. The bottom piece is Georges Breguet's specimen.
Attachment:
File comment: Palué, probably 1950-1960, sold at Klefisch 2002
Ikat - Palue - Klefisch Auktion 95 Lot 104.jpg [ 114.25 KiB | Viewed 7217 times ]
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File comment: Palué, Mid 20th C. National Gallery of Australia
Ikat - Palue - mid 20th C. - NGA 86.1921.jpg [ 96.31 KiB | Viewed 7217 times ]
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File comment: Palué, probably modern, in village Mitunglea, found on Baltyra.com
Ikat - Palue - Tama - Baltyra.com.jpg [ 104.9 KiB | Viewed 7217 times ]
I believe the evidence to be overwhelming - though not beyond all doubt because of the absence of true cognates with certified provenance. Most striking in the presence of what appears to be a simple, rather angular emulation of patola jilamprang. Now we are faced with an very interesting question. Not quite a mystery, but close: the two oldest known Palué sarongs, the one in George Breguet’s collection and mine, both have ikat in white on saturated indigo, and
cyclamen and violet stripes done in chemical dyes. Nota bene chemical dyes of an early type not used anywhere else in the archipelago. The Palué women who made these cloths, probably between 1875 and 1910, used Perkins violet, also known as mauvine and aniline purple, which was discovered in 1854 – the world’s first synthetic dye. It is quite miraculous that these chemicals made it to Palué, but not to any of the surrounding islands. Very likely it is the result of the climate: Palué has a dry season that lasts for nine months, during which time the go men wandering across the seas to look for seasonal work and commercial opportunities. The would sail very far, making use of a very steady distribution of winds: east for months on end, then west for months on end. So they may well have the Perkins violet or aniline on Java or Sumatra where in the late 19th C. the Dutch were introducing various technical innovations, notably in textile production and printing, both industries that enthusiastically picked up on aniline – as well as on fuchsine, a little to the red side of the spectrum, which was discovered four years later. Wherever the Palué men got these dyes, they apparently kept them exclusive for their own womenfolk, who used it to give their sarongs spectacular dashes of bright, intense colour.
Interestingly, both GB's example were found on the route a prahu would follow when sailing east from Palué in an easterly direction, i.e. towards the Solor and Alor Archipelago and from there perhaps on towards Timor and the South Moluccas. Mine had a lable saying it came from East Adonara, his saying it came from Kedang - where, and this again is interesting, indigo, rather than morinda is de rigueur for bridewealth sarongs. There is a whole lot more to say about this, but that is a chapter in itself.
More detail on this cloth at:
http://ikat.us/ikat_209.phpEnjoy,
Peter
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Peter ten Hoopen
www.ikat.us
PUSAKA COLLECTION: ONLINE MUSEUM OF TRADITIONAL INDONESIAN IKAT TEXTILES