PRINTS: REFLECTING THE ETHNIC DIVERSITY OF INDIAN TEXTILE ART FORM - FASHION

PRINTS: REFLECTING THE ETHNIC DIVERSITY OF INDIAN TEXTILE ART FORM

Indian Prints & Paintings have been a exquisite art form since ages, capturing the authentic beauty of multicultural India. The country has the oldest and continued history of art in all artistic manifestations, be it Painting, Sculpture or Architecture. Here often art has been depicted through natural organic mediums which is easy on the eye and yet shows the artistic creativity in abundance. The grace and elegance have been maintained from Stone Age to the Neo Modern Day.

THE PRINTS JOURNEY

TEXTILE PRINTING:  

The process of covering a fabric in definite patterns or designs by applying colours is called Textile Printing. The colours are bonded with the fabric to resist friction and washing. In a way printing can be related to dyeing where the whole fabric is uniformly covered with one colour whereas in printing one or more colours are applied to it in certain parts only and that too in sharply defined patterns. In Printing Stencils, Wooden Blocks, Rollers, Engraved Plates or Silk Screens are used to place colors on the fabric. Colourants used in printing contain dyes thickened to prevent the color from spreading by capillary attraction beyond the limits of the pattern or design.

Popular Indian Textile printing forms are Kalamkari, Bandhani, Batik, Nandana, Ikkat , Sanganeri , Bagru and Bandhej.                                        

Kalamkari remains the most popular Indian textile printing form. Kalamkari is a hand painted or block printed technique on a cotton or silk fabric using natural dyes. Kalam means pen and kari craftsmanship in Persian. It's a old craft practiced by the natives of Andhra Pradesh. There are two distinctive type of Kalamkari  art in India , one the Srikalahasti style and the other Machalipatnam style. In srikalahasti style the "kalam" or pen is used for free hand drawing of the subject and filling in the colours is entirely hand worked, where as machalipatnam  involves both painting and printing. The outlines are printed with carved blocks whereas the interior portions are filled in with vegetable dyes using the kalam. The shrikalahasti style draws inspiration from the hindu mythology and depicts the religious structures, gods and heroes whereas the machalipatnam style potrays an intricate plethora of motifs and wildlife forms. The production of both the forms is similar to a large extent, the technique consists of a painstaking process of resist dyeing and hand printing. It involves seventeen meticulous steps for the shrikalahasti style and tweleve laborious steps for the machalipatnam style. Kalamkari continues to epitomize the inventive dexterity of the Indian artists and the wisdom of this ancient civilization who found materials in nature to express their creative beings and honour esteemed persons among them. Actually in ancient times groups of singers ,musicians and painters called chitrakattis moved village to village singing and narrating hindu mythological stories, also illustrating the accounts using large bolts of canvas painted on the spot using rudimentary means and dyes from herbs and plants. This led to the birth of Kalamkari which was patronized by the mughals and the Golconda sultanate. After declining for a while it was again revived and the Britishers also formed an interest in this decorative art for clothing. In the intricate kalamkari art process the fabric is immersed in a mixture of myrabalam (resin) and cow milk for an hour to get its glossiness, contours and reasons are then drawn with a point in bamboo soaked in a mixture of  fermented jagri and water. One by one these are applied along with the vegetable dyes and different colours to be washed later. Each fabric can at times undergo 20 washes; also various affects are obtained using cow dung, seeds, plants and crushed flowers.

Distinct Methods of Printing:

Hand Block Printing: In this process a design is drawn on or transferred to a prepared wooden block, where a separate block is required for each distinct colour in the design. The block cutter carves the wood and the block presents the appearance of flat relief carving with the design standing out. Fine details are very difficult to cut in wood and maintain while printing and wear down often, they are therefore invariably built in strips of brass or copper,bent to shape and driven edgewise into the flat surface of the block. This method is known as coppering.To print the design on the fabric, the printer applies colour to the block and presses it firmly and steadily on the cloth ensuring a good impression by striking it smartly on the back with a wodden mallet. The second impression is made in the same way taking care to see that it fits exactly to the first. Each succeeding impression is made in precisely the same manner until the length of the cloth is fully printed. When this is done it is wound over the drying rollers, thus bringing forward a fresh length to be treated similarly. If the patterns contain several colours the fabric is usually first printed throughout with one colour then dried and printed with the second and repeated until all the colours are printed. Block printing by hand is a slow process, however capable of yielding highly artistic results some of which are unachievable in other forms of printing.

Perrotine Printing: Perrot of rouen in 1834 invented this block printing machine called Perrotine, which is practically till date the only successful mechanical device ever introduced for this purpose. Although block printing has been mostly replaced by roller printing, its still popular in French, German and Italian works except British. For certain classes of work the perrotine possesses great advantages over the hand block for its rate of production enhancement and the joining up of various impressions to each other more exactly without breaks in continuity of line can be noticed in well executed works. But  perrotine can only be applied to patterns containing not more than there colours nor exceeding five inches in vertical repeat, whereas hand block printing has no such limitations. So perrotine is considered best for utilitarian character and hand block for decorative work of print designs.

Engraved Copperplate Printing: Thomas Bell of United Kingdom in 1770 invented the printing of textiles from engraved copperplates. The presses first used were of the ordinary letterpress type, the engraved plate being fixed in its place. In later improvements the well-known cylinder press was used; the plate was inked mechanically and cleaned off by passing under a sharp blade of steel, and the cloth instead of being laid on the plate was passed round the pressure cylinder. The plate was raised into frictional contact with the cylinder and in passing under it transferred its ink to the cloth. The great difficulty in plate printing was to make the various impressions join up exactly. This could never be done with any certainty; the process was eventually confined to patterns complete in one repeat and was made obsolete by roller printing.

Roller & Cylinder or Machine Printing: This elegant and efficient form of printing was further patented by Thomas Bell in 1785. Bell's first patent was for a machine to print six colours at once but this incomplete development was not immediately successful, although the principle of the method was shown to be practical by the printing of one colour with perfectly satisfactory results. The difficulty was to keep the six rollers with each carrying a portion of the pattern in perfect register with each other. This defect was soon overcome by Adam Parkinson of Manchester, and in 1785 only Bells machine with Parkinson's improvement was successfully employed by Messrs Livesey- Hargreaves- Hall & Co. of Bamber Bridge, Preston, for the printing of calico in from two to six colours at a single operation The advantages possessed by roller printing over other contemporary processes were three: firstly, its high productivity, 10000 to 12000 yards being commonly printed in one day of ten hours by a single-colour machine, secondly by its capacity of being applied to the reproduction of every style of design  ranging from the fine delicate lines of copperplate engraving and the small repeats and limited colours of the perrotine to the broadest effects of block printing and to patterns varying in repeat from 1 to 80   and thirdly the wonderful exactitude with which each portion of an elaborate multicolour pattern can be fitted into its proper place without faulty joints at its points of repetition

Stencil Printing: The art of stenciling is relatively new. It has been applied to the decoration of textile fabrics from long by the Japanese and of late years, has found increasing employment in Europe for certain classes of decorative work on woven goods for furnishing purposes. The pattern is cut out of a sheet of stout paper or thin metal with a sharp-pointed knife, the uncut portions representing the part that is to be reserved or left uncoloured. The sheet is now laid on the material to be decorated and colour is brushed through its interstices. It is obvious that with suitable planning an all over pattern may be just as easily produced by this process as by hand or machine printing, and  if several plates are used then as many colours as plates may be introduced into it. S.H Sharp patented in 1894 a single colour stenciling machine which consisted of a endless stencil plate that passed continuously over a revolving cast iron cylinder and between the two the cloth to be ornamented passed and the colour was forced on to it through the holes in the stencil mechanically.

Screen Printing: Screen printing is by far the most used printing technology today. There are two types of screen printing, one is  rotary screen printing and the other is flat (bed) screen printing. A blade squeezes the printing paste through openings in the screen onto the fabric to print designs.

Digital  Textile Printing: Digital textile printing is often referred to as direct to garment printing (DTG) .This is a process of printing on textiles and garments using specialized or modified inkjet technology. Inkjet printing on fabric is also possible with an inkjet printer by using fabric sheets with a removable paper backing. Today major inkjet technology manufacturers can offer specialized products designed for direct printing on textiles, not only for sampling but also for bulk production. Since the early 1990′s the inkjet technology specially developed water-based ink (known as dye-sublimation or disperse direct ink) and has offered the possibility of printing directly onto polyester fabric. This is mainly related to visual communication in retail and brand promotion (flags, banners and other point of sales applications). Printing onto nylon and silk can be done by using an acid ink. Reactive ink is used for cellulose based fibers, such as cotton and linen. Using inkjet technology in digital textile printing allows for single pieces, mid-run production and even long-run alternatives to screen printed fabric.

So the Print art has truly evolved with the Time and use of Technology.

Manjul Thapliyal

Principal Consultant

Visions Ahead

Web:  www.visionsahead.com

This article can also be viewed at http://www.articlesbase.com/art-articles/textile-printing-reflecting-the-ethinic-diversity-of-indian-art-forms-6430102.html

Embroideries: India's Distinct Ethnic Art Heritage & Luxury - Fashion & Luxury

Embroideries: India's Distinct Ethnic Art Heritage & Luxury

For Ages India was known as the "LAND OF GOLDEN BIRD" for its natural and manufactured riches. Today is the modern revival of that golden era thru its distinct and luxe art forms.

EMBROIDERY: 

HAND EMBROIDERY: The art or handicraft of decorating fabrics, leathers or other materials with embellishments like sequins , pearls, beads, quills, metal strips, Swarovski's knotted by threads and yarns through the needle is known as hand embroidery. This imperial heritage   turns out masterpieces of workmanship in fabrics by the amalgamation of figures, patterns, drapes and knots. Embroidery is also an expression of self, rendered with patience and dedicated hard work and rightly described as a painting by the needle which adds grace and elegance to articles of everyday use. The traditional Indian techniques of hand embroidery are nakshi, saadi, chikhan, aari, zardozi, wasli, gota, and kohra. Through the centuries embroiderers have experimented with the materials available to them, adopting and refining their techniques, drawing inspiration from their surroundings or from the art and ornament of other times and cultures and some new embroidery forms emerged like kantha, kasuti, phulkari, appliqué, banjara, kashmiri, abla ,kamal kadai, negi  patch work and kutch. But the striking fact remains that in the development of embroidery there are no major changes of materials or techniques which can be felt or interpreted as advances from a primitive to a later more refined stage. On the other hand we often find in the early works better technical accomplishment and high standard of intricate craftsmanship which is rarely attained nowadays.

Zardozi remains the most popular form of traditional Indian embroidery and is immensely appreciated worldwide. Zar means gold and dozi is embroidery in Persian, so it means sewing with a gold or silver string. Intricate patterns traced in gold and silver, studded with seed pearls and precious stones enhance the shimmering beauty of silk, velvet and brocade. Emperor Akbar greatly patronized the art and it reached its zenith under his rule but later Aurangzeb discouraged the art form. The art of zardozi was revived along with many traditional methods in the middle of this century. Zari work was mainly done in madras and zardozi in Hyderabad until a few decades ago; today Lucknow is home to the finest work of gold and silver embroidery. The non availability of gold on a large scale also became a hurdle in making of zari threads, this problem was finally overcome by combing copper wire with a golden sheen and gold coloured silk thread.  Zardozi embroidery is hand stitched predominantly by skilled muslim men, fashioned with a needle that resembles a small crochet hook used to run up and down through the cloth while the fabric is pulled tightly on a large wooden frame. With one hand the craftsman holds a retaining thread below the fabric, in the other he holds a hook or a needle with which he picks up the appliqué materials. Then he passes the needle or the hook through the fabric and after painstaking labour produces an exquisite gold veined work of art. This form of embroidery allows the craftsman to use both hands as he works, the hand above the fabric works the needle while the hand below ties each stitch making zardozi products not only beautiful but durable too.

MACHINE EMBROIDERY: The embroidery process where a sewing or embroidery machine is used to create design patterns on textiles through threads, yarns and even sequences.

The two types of machine embroidery are Free-motion sewing machine embroidery and Computerized machine embroidery.

In Free Motion Embroidery a basic zigzag sewing machine is skillfully used by the operator to create a design by moving the tightly hooped fabric under the needle. Since the standard machine has only one needle the threads have to be manually changed subsequently for multi color designs along with trimming and cleaning up loose and connecting threads after the design completion. Hence each design is unique and cannot be reproduced exactly.

Whereas in a Computerized Embroidery the computer digitally controls and engineers the machine through user inputs to read and sew  pre programmed design patterns .These  multi needle machines are generally threaded prior and do not require re-threading  while  running the design. Correct color change sequence input is also provided before the embroidery, some can also automatically trim and change the colors. Multi needle machines may consist of multiple sewing heads where each can sew the same design on a separate garment concurrently. A machine might have 20 or more heads, each consisting of 15 of more needles. The head is usually capable of producing many special fabric effects including chain stitch & satin stitch, sequins, appliqué and cutwork.

DIFFERENCE IN HAND AND MACHINE EMBROIDERY: Both hand and machine embroidery can at times look quite similar and complex to differentiate, but you actually can lookout for the minute differences.

Material: Hand embroidery mainly uses silk threads on silk fabrics and since it’s delicate it becomes difficult to use them on machines as they get broken often. Machine embroideries generally use artificial fibers & artificial silk threads that are stronger in nature.

Size of threads: Silk embroideries use split silk threads which are actually split from one full silk strand, whereas machine embroidery uses full threads. When making one silk embroidery design the embroiderer will use different sizes of silk threads as the thinner silk threads are more smooth and can have more colors mixed to make them look more realistic and exquisite. In machine embroidery all the threads are in the same size and not split.

Stitches: Handmade silk embroidery can never be identical replication even if design is the same due to the inconsistency of stitches, whereas in machine embroidery stitches have a regular pattern and are almost same.

Colors: The hand embroideries look more colorful and exquisite since they use bright silk colors while the machine embroideries look a bit dull when compared together. Also hand embroideries look neater and machine embroidery rough.

Hence Embroideries will always standout for their Uniqueness and Exquisite Layouts, be it any Era.

Manjul Thapliyal

Principal Consultant

Visions Ahead

Web:  www.visionsahead.com

This article can also be viewed at http://www.articlesbase.com/art-articles/embroideries-indias-distinct-ethnic-art-heritage-luxury-6414864.html

Soft Skills & Image Building Techniques - Training & Development

Soft Skills & Image Building Techniques       

Attaining the Right set of Skills at the Relevant Time to Be Successful in Today's Global Scenario through Soft Skills & Image Building Techniques.    

SOFT SKILLS is the winning mantra in today's  highly competitive sector across diversified domains. Soft Skills is an enhancement to your Hard Skills and formulate your self actualization Success Story, which further leads you towards your ultimate goals. Hard Skills are those skills which one acquires through education and work experience and reveals that whether you have the required knowledge and skills to get the prospective work done. They are reflective set of benchmarks for a particular field.

Soft Skills, also known as People's skills help you differentiate from regular employees to excellent employees.  It's an art of interacting, presenting and building the right professional relationships by attaining the ability to adapt and think creatively to solve problems in a given scenario. These skills encompass interpersonal communications, collaborations, Personality & Behavioral Development, cross-culture management, Presentations, professionalism and adhering to meet critical deadlines.

These skills automatically reflect on your body image, self image, self esteem, self confidence, self competence, self actualization and your achievements. Opportunity & Deliverance are two keys which make a mark in your success in a competitive set-up. So whenever the opportunity arises, one must grab it with both hands and perform to the best of his ability on the given day and seize the momentum. Here the right mix of Soft & Hard skills helps you perform and create the right impression and appropriate image at the suitable time. The corporate scenario acknowledges these skills and looks positively towards such career aspirants who have acquired such wining skills or strive to acquire them in the due process of professionalism. For organizations the winning mantra is simple in the testing times, they look to hire faster, smarter and cheaper people with adequate people's skills. Horizontal cultures are prevailing over the prior vertical cultures and so are the command and control managerial hierarchy being replaced by collaborative practices. To achieve common company oriented goals, the core competencies are increasingly becoming Team driven.

IMAGE MANAGEMENT is the proactive ongoing process through which you continuously control and evaluate the impact of your appearance on you, others and achievement of your goals. It's a framework incorporating all elements of body language, clothing, grooming, etiquette and communication, which eventually helps creating the right image for each role a person undertakes at different occasions. Image Management also imbibes the different aspects of the person, including the inner self, characteristics, as well as the outer environment working towards achieving the image goal .The people we meet judge us by what they see about us, although we individually have different set of experience ability and skills. So our appearance or Image reflects vibes about us, based on what one decides quickly to connect with you or discard you. So as you evolve as a human, first and foremost the body image develops which affects the self image, self esteem, self confidence and this helps you perform better.

Simultaneously soft skill increases your competency level and reflects on your confidence and self esteem. Hence projection of a winning image and possessing soft skills are the dual & vital ingredients of survival in today's professional world.

Manjul Thapliyal

Principal Consultant

Visions Ahead

Web:  www.visionsahead.com

This article can also be viewed at http://www.articlesbase.com/career-management-articles/soft-skills-image-building-techniques-6414477.html