Guizhou minority areas are traditional batik producing areas, and Anshun, Kaili, Danzhai, Ping Huang and Leishan are all famous batik towns. In the depths of the mountains, Miao women arbitrarily describe everything that can be seen in nature, such as flowers, fruits, birds, insects and fish, exaggerated gestures, bold deformation, free and random description or rigorous geometric patterns, and the verve wax lines drawn with copper pens, all of which present a mysterious, lively and romantic aesthetic feeling, full of life breath, and contain the connotation of ancient culture, forming a unique style of batik.
According to historical records, Guizhou batik began in the Han Dynasty and has a history of more than 2,000 years. Batik patterns originated from copying patterns on copper drums. The method used at that time was to cover the surface of the copper drum with cloth, rub it back and forth with wax, and transfer the pattern on the copper drum to the cloth after dyeing. This method is similar to friction. Later, people invented the copper wax knife, dipped in melted wax liquid, and could easily draw directly on the cloth at will. This method changes batik from copying to creation, gets rid of the bondage of bronze drum pattern, and is conducive to forming its own unique artistic style, giving full play to the performance of batik tools and embodying the beauty of batik materials.
Homemade cloth is the most commonly used batik in Guizhou, which is thick and durable and has a unique texture effect. However, before painting wax, it is necessary to cook with plant ash or cow dung for two or three hours to bleach, dry in the sun, size, grind and dry in the sun, so as to fully show the charm of batik process.
The main wax materials for batik printing are beeswax, white wax and wood wax. Even Liquidambar formosana juice can be used as anti-dyeing material after being boiled at high temperature, usually mixed with beeswax and white wax. Liquidambar formosana is the symbol and incarnation of Miao ancestors and the sacred tree worshipped by Miao people. The sap of Liquidambar formosana is reddish, which Miao people think is the blood of their ancestors and has magical power, so it is used to depict their totems and admirers. Later, it was found that the gum and sugar in maple juice from beautiful maple have anti-dyeing effect, which is usually drawn after heating and stirring with butter, and the pattern is more vivid after dyeing. So they painted on white cloth with a hundred-year-old maple juice, dyed and rinsed, and made sacrificial clothes and flags, which were passed down from sacrificial supplies to daily necessities. This is the folk tradition of "maple leaf dyeing".
Ancient dyes, mainly natural dyes, are divided into plant dyes, animal dyes and mineral pigments. From the discovery of ancient textiles and literature records, from pre-Qin to Han Dynasty, mineral pigments were mainly used. At that time, minerals were mostly ground into powder, and these colors were collectively called mineral colors. At the same time, from Xia Dynasty to Warring States, not only various mineral dyes were developed, but also plant dyes were used. In some areas, a small amount of dyes comes from animal blood. After the Han Dynasty, mineral pigments were not used much, and plants became more and more popular. The original dyeing method with fresh leaves of Polygonum hydropiper was improved to completely soak the leaves of Polygonum hydropiper in water, then add lime in proportion to make indigo, and then dye. Madder, safflower and sappan are red dyes, Polygonum cuspidatum and Indigofera are blue dyes, and Cotinus coggygria, Gardenia, Sophora japonica and Radix Curcumae are yellow dyes. These commonly used plant dyes developed into relatively fixed printing dyes in the Tang Dynasty.
Polygonum plants have been widely used as the main dyeing materials for batik by Miao people in eastern Guizhou since ancient times. Other plant dyes and mineral dyes (cinnabar) are used for painting or painting. Indigo dyeing is stable and not easy to fade. A batik garment can often be worn for more than ten years or even longer. Villagers put the harvested stems and leaves of bluegrass into pools, vats, wooden barrels or pits, then press heavy stones on them, soak them in cold water for 6-7 days, and turn them over every two days until they are completely soaked and fermented, and purple bubbles float on the water surface, and the indigo leaves are removed. Then deepen the quicklime according to a certain proportion, pour it into a jar, and stir it with a water ladle or bamboo pole for 1-2 hours (about 5 kg of indigo leaves 1 kg of lime). After a night, indigo condenses and precipitates, and the clear water on it is poured out to form indigo slurry (commonly known as "dried indigo"). But to dye, indigo pulp must be mixed with dyeing promoters such as water, plant ash water and corn wine, and the dye solution is good.
In-cylinder dyeing is a very important link. In the process of dip dyeing, the white cloth is soaked in warm water (about 20 degrees Celsius) for several hours, and then put into the dye vat for dip dyeing. In addition, in the dyeing process, it is necessary to repeatedly size 1-2 times with soybean water, red seed root water, local wine and cow glue to increase the adhesion of dyes. The more times you soak, the darker the color. This is repeated for three to five days to confirm that the fabric has been dyed.
After dyeing the wax cloth, it is necessary to add a proper amount of water to the iron pot to boil, then add a little salt, and put the fabric into boiling water for high-temperature dewaxing treatment to remove the residual wax and floating color on the fabric surface. Finally, take out the wax cloth, rinse it repeatedly in clean water, so that the residual wax and floating color can be completely separated from the fabric, then dry it in the sun, and then process it into practical products as needed.