Entrepreneurship and the batik industry in Pekalongan

Batik Nyonyas Talks

Entrepreneurship and the batik industry in Pekalongan

Wednesday, 27 November 2024

7–8pm

Ngee Ann Auditorium

Asian Civilisations Museum

Click here to register: https://batiknyonyas27novtalk.peatix.com

Situated on Java’s north coast, Pekalongan emerged as a batik centre in the 1850s, and by the 1890s it had overtaken competitors such as Batavia (Jakarta), Surakarta, and Lasem to become the island’s preeminent producer. This talk discusses the biographies of prominent Chinese batik workshops and traders in Pekalongan and its surrounding districts. It examines the development of Pekalongan’s batik industry in the context of Indonesia’s quest for independence, as well as shifting market forces within the nation and beyond. This talk is organised in conjunction with Batik Nyonyas: Three Generations of Art and Entrepreneurship, at the Peranakan Museum till 31 August 2025.

Light refreshments will be served from 6pm onwards at the basement foyer.

About the Speakers

Seng Guo-Quan is assistant professor of history at the National University of Singapore. His research focuses on Chinese societies in Southeast Asia, with a special interest in inter-ethnic relations, gender and sexuality, and modes of transactions within capitalism. He is the author of Strangers in the Family: Gender, Patriliny and the Chinese in Colonial Indonesia (2023). He also serves on the Board of Advisors of the Asian Civilisations Museum and Peranakan Museum.

Didi Kwartanada writes extensively on the Chinese community in Indonesia. His works include “Bangsawan prampoewan: Enlightened Peranakan Chinese women from early twentieth century Java” (2017) and “From Oei Tiong Ham to Ferry Salim: Visualization of the Chinese dandies, ca. 1900–2002” (Asian Culture, 2023).

Image: Women workers in Tee Boen Kee’s batik workshop in Java, 1920s. P. de Kat Angelino, Batikrapport, 1930. Vol. 1, p. 82.

The Batik Nyonyas talk series is organised in conjunction with the special exhibition Batik Nyonyas: Three Generations of Art and Entrepreneurship.