Skirt cloth (kain panjang) with design of anemones

In the decades around 1900 Dutch and Eurasian women played an innovative role in batik production, establishing batik workshops along the north coast of Java around the town of Pekalongan. One of the most famous of these ateliers was directed by Eliza van Zuylen whose workshop operated in Pekalongan from 1890-1946. Her batiks catered to the tastes of the local Dutch, Eurasian and Chinese settlers as well as to the Western export market. Typically, these cloths were brightly coloured with naturalistic designs of birds and her trade mark bouquets of flowers "buketan".

Asian Art Department, June 2003.