Dabu is a mud-resist hand-block printing practiced in Rajasthan of India. The prints have a sublime quality and appearance. In making of the printed fabrics, a lot of manual process and hard work is involved and the process of uses lots of natural dyes and vegetable pastes. Here is a brief outline of the process.
1. First of all Fabric is received from the mills. Traditionally mill made cloth of 30s, 60s and Mull is used. It is heavily sized. For that it needs to be desized. Desizing is done by repeatedly beating the wet fabric against a hard surface (stone). It is frequently kept for a day after such beating so that enzymatic reaction can loosen the size. Next day it is again beaten and so on. This process continues for three days.
2. After that the fabric is dipped in Myrobalan (Tanning) agent. The myrobalan paste is prepared about three hours in advance by mixing about 2kg paste for 100 m of fabric.
3.After that the fabric is dried in the sunlight
4. After that fabric is printed once with a paste of Alum+ Tamarind Seed+Direct dye to distinguish. (Red Process-No Dabu)
5. After that fabric is washed once, and then it is dried and then go for boiling. In boiling we boil the fabric with Dhauri Ke Phool ( Jaloor)+ Alizarin ( Madder)+Mahi for 1 hour at 100deg Celcius. The fabric is circulated about 5 times using Bamboo Poles. If the color required is dark then some iron water needs to be added.
6. After it is dried and then the next process of Dabu is done. Printing paste is made using ( Jaggery, Hydrate of Lime, Kali Mitti and Gum ( Nigeria). The paste is then spread over a coir to give it a base. The printing is done using blocks. (White Process-Dabu).
Saw dust is sprinkled over the fabric as it is printed so that the block applied should not smear the other sides
1. Then it is dried in the sunlight.
After that the fabric is treated with Myrobalan again.
3. Then it is dried and then dipped completely in Alum + Water.
4. Then it is dried and washed and again boiled with Alizarin+ Mahi( Sakur)+ Dhawdi. Then it is dried in the sun and washed to reveal the dabu resist .
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