CALICO: the PROJECT hand-dyed fabric
THE WEST: A Piece of Cloth and the Longing for Cotton Tenjiku
Since ancient times, the Japanese have been gazing at the strange things arriving from China and other countries. The continent was a distant shore that was not easily accessible from the Japanese archipelago. The information and designs projected onto the pieces of cloth, like meteorites falling from the sky, must have fueled their wild imaginations.
Sarasa, with its beautifully abstracted depictions of continental nature, must have been particularly desirable, and highly prized by people seeking a moment away from the mundane world and the company of the tea ceremony.
While working in India, I was surrounded by so many beautiful block print patterns that I even began to wonder if the world really needed any more new block print designs. However, I still thought that there might be something that only a Japanese person who had seen chintz in the Far East could create and appreciate, so I planned and created some designs that were small reproductions of old chintz.
The same pattern can have different weight and meaning depending on the time, place, and person. We are all relative to each other through a piece of cloth, and the way we perceive it is culture itself. This completely turned the fixed perspective of myself and my close friends in India around.
The cloth fragments talk about the grand premise that, in a context different from the West (Western Europe)'s feeling of Orientalism in Indian fabrics, the East has been gazing at them with fervor, and that India has always been the West that Japan longs for. It's like a stone from another planet with a different weight.
West Indian tie-dye
West Indian Block Prints
South Indian block prints_coming soon
West Indian tie-dye
Tie-dyeing is a traditional technique found in various parts of India, but is especially popular in Western India. In Gujarat and Rajasthan, shawls called odani and veils called ghoonghats are tied with bandhani or rolled with laharia. In terms of everyday use, it has been largely replaced by screen printing and digital printing, but you can still see people wearing authentic tie-dye.
When SIDR craft from Kutch came to Japan for the "Kutch Fabrics" exhibition in 2018, there was a misunderstanding that they were imitating Japanese Shibori. This prompted CALICO to start a project to restore traditional rabari designs and a project on "bandanas," which are said to have their origins in bandhani. In recent years, the company has also been working on design projects for natural-dyed lahariya and motara in Rajasthan.
Bandhani aba (dress) created with SIDR Crafts, 2023
Photo by Haruhi Okuyama, Modeling by Chisa Matsumoto
Woman doing Lahariya (rolled tie-dyeing) 2025
West Indian Block Prints
Block printing (textile printing or discharge printing using woodblocks or brass plates) is one of the handmade fabrics that is loved by many people because of its richness of expression and ease of use. In modern times, there are many screen prints and digital prints that are completely indistinguishable from block printing, and opportunities to see block prints themselves are rapidly disappearing. It is a tradition found throughout India, but the traditional patterns handed down throughout Rajasthan are particularly distinctive and continue to attract the interest of collectors both in Japan and abroad. Ajrak, made by artisans from the Khatri community in Kutch and Barmer, is also attracting attention for maintaining its process and sophisticated design. Originally a simple patterned cloth for pastoralists brought from Sindh in Pakistan, in recent years, many artisans have been producing artisans who are taking on new expressions by utilizing the traditional techniques.
Many block prints were developed in the court culture as a substitute for hand-painted cloth or an efficient alternative. They were also made and used by specific communities in many villages in Western India. Some of these cloths became known as calico prints in modern times and attracted attention in Western Europe and East Asian countries. Some of them were introduced to Japan and collectively called chintz.
Rajasthan block prints were originally diverse in each region. Different designs were created by printers called chipas, or by villages, homes, and users, but that culture itself is now on the verge of disappearing. Local researcher Madan Meena launched a block print archive project after seeing the last chipa in the village go out of business and the woodblocks that had been used for generations being discarded. He has also asked for cooperation from the Iwatate Folk Textile Museum and researcher and Japanese painter Mitsutoshi Hatanaka in Japan, and is gradually collecting images of block print designs created since the 1970s.
CALICO's block print endeavors began with a desire to revive the traditions of chintz, a fabric that Japanese people once admired and adored, but as we met artisans and their families and learned more about their culture, we were drawn to the harmonious patterns that they traditionally valued.Modern patterns are also interesting because they are created by them, and we sometimes introduce them.
Balotra print gurgler. 2024
Photo by Haruhi Okuyama
The Kowata Sarasa pattern was created using a brass plate. 2022
Photo by Haruhi Okuyama
Soni dress with authentic Ajurack pattern. 2023
Photo by Haruhi Okuyama, Modeling by Chisa Matsumoto
500 count miniature ajrak shawl by Sufiyan Ismail Khatri and more. 2024
Photo by Haruhi Okuyama, Modeling by Chisa Matsumoto
Dr. Ismail Mohamed Khatri at the Ajurak workshop held in Nara in 2024