Practicing "Batik" with Middle School

Creating colourful designs on fabric has been a long standing tradition in many cultures. Though not a traditional batik process, the students were quite interested in developing their pieces using white glue as a resist.

For this piece, students drew from life, using the plants around the classroom. The drawing was done on paper first, then outlined in black marker. Wax paper was put over top, and then the fabric. Students then traced their design onto the fabric using white school glue. This was done in the first class session.

In the second class, we used diluted acrylics to paint in the colours. After it was completely painted and dried, the glue was washed out. We used this project in an exploration of warm and cool colours and how to develop levels of contrast in their work, and discussed the works of Georgia O'Keeffe for colour pallet inspiration. The students were quite excited about the process, and enjoyed working with the different colours.

Other possibilities for this project- creating it with multiple layerings of glue/colour rather than the single painting step to see if we can get the full batik effect. Definitely something to think about for next time...