A Length of Shirakage Shibori: Blue-on-White Stacked Diamonds
early to mid twentieth century
36" x 13", 91.5 cm x 33 cm
Shirakage shibori is said to be one of the most difficult shibori techniques to master because one needs to resist most of the white cloth in order to achieve an indigo dyed design that is fine, linear and stark blue against the pure white ground.
Here we see a beautifully dyed fragment of this kind of resist dyed cotton.
The repeat design of zigzag or stacked diamonds is first stitched into the cotton. Any part of the cloth which is meant to remain white must be hidden from the dye bath when it is submerged--and the entire piece of cloth is dyed, so great care must be taken to never let the intended white areas of cloth to come into contact with the dye bath. The process of hiding the white areas is too lengthy to get into here, but suffice it to say that anyone who has attempted to master shibori dyeing can attest to the great skill and patience needed to achieve a bright white surface when doing the shirakage tecnhnique.
This is a wonderful length of cloth, and with the exception of ingrained creases, it is in bright condition, with a good, rich indigo color still present.