New embroidery technique from an old hand<\/p>\n
By Bambang M.<\/p>\n
YOGYAKARTA (JP): After her recent success in creating the
\nbiggest embroidery in the country, and possibly in the world, now
\n70-year-old Jumima Dewi Nugroho has recorded another success.
\nThis time a new embroidery technique comes out of her old hands.<\/p>\n
\"I call it the random embroidery technique,\" said the woman,
\nwho is also an owner of a batik museum here.<\/p>\n
Dewi who has seven grandchildren and three great grandchildren
\nsaid she discovered the technique after conducting a number of
\nexperiments of her own.<\/p>\n
In conventional embroidery, all the threads go in the same
\ndirection but in her new technique, the threads may go in
\ndifferent directions. \"Just like in painting, you use strokes in
\ndifferent directions,\" she explained.<\/p>\n
The result is incredible. With her method, a person's face
\nthat she \"draws\" with the embroidery technique will not be far
\ndifferent from a picture. And unlike other embroidery, her works
\nfeature perfect gradation of colors.<\/p>\n
\"It was very difficult to embroider people's faces that would
\nclosely resemble the real ones. The old technique cannot produce
\ngood results or a perfect gradation of colors,\" Dewi said.<\/p>\n
In her big house on Jl. Dr. Soetomo in Yogyakarta, she now has
\nembroidery of 50 faces, some of them are Indonesian heroes like
\nPrince Diponegoro or top figures like the late first president
\nSukarno.<\/p>\n
Dewi said sometimes she gave away her embroideries to
\nrelatives of people whom she has transformed into embroidery.<\/p>\n
\"In 1991 my son gave the embroidery of president Sukarno to
\nhis relatives and it was Mbak Megawati (Sukarno's daughter and
\nnow the country's Vice President) herself who received it,\" she
\nrecalled, adding that it was the first embroidery of a person's
\nface that she had created.<\/p>\n
Dewi, however, does not create embroidery for money. She does
\nit simply because she likes it.<\/p>\n
She has been embroidering since she was young. However, Dewi
\nbegan to do it seriously 20 years ago, after her husband, Hadi
\nNugraha, suffered a stroke. To keep her sick husband company, she
\nembroidered and has been doing so until now.<\/p>\n
To her knowledge, no one is embroidering using her technique,
\nso she is considering setting up an embroidery museum in her
\nhouse. \"Maybe I'll realize it next year,\" Dewi said.<\/p>\n
Crucifixion<\/p>\n
Among her works, she considers her 4 meter x 0.9 meter
\nembroidery depicting Jesus Christ's crucifixion on Mount
\nGolgota--the biggest embroidery she has ever made--her
\nmasterpiece.<\/p>\n
Inspiration for the piece came from the world's biggest glass
\npainting of Jan Syka's The Crucifixion, which is kept at the
\nGlendale Museum in California, the United States. In 1994, Dewi
\nand her husband visited the museum and her husband was so
\nimpressed by the painting that he bought a photo of it.<\/p>\n
\"I don't know why but I was so challenged to make the
\ncrucifixion embroidery on my return,\" she said. With the support
\nof her husband and her entire family, she started the embroidery
\nin 1996.<\/p>\n
She enlarged a copy of The Crucifixion's photo onto a 4m x
\n0.9m paper. Then she placed the picture on a special cloth,
\nlocally known as strimin. She then embroidered the cloth by
\ntracing the picture.<\/p>\n
She completed the piece in three and a half years.<\/p>\n
\"Of course I didn't do it every day. I just did it when I
\nwanted to. Sometimes I didn't even touch it for a week,\" said
\nDewi, adding that once, she was forced to stop work for two
\nmonths due to an eye surgery.<\/p>\n
Her hard work is not wasted. Many people have been impressed
\nby her masterpiece and because of its extraordinary size, many
\npeople have advised her to register her work at the Indonesian
\nMuseum of Records (MURI).<\/p>\n
Her work was declared by the museum as the biggest embroidery
\nin Indonesia on Aug. 4 this year.<\/p>\n
Now, all the she wants to do is to transfer her skill to
\nothers. None of three children have inherited her skill as they
\nare too busy earning money, she said. However, she has been
\nteaching her new embroidery technique to her house maids and
\nemployees who help take care of her batik museum.<\/p>\n
But it appears she will get a chance to transfer her skill to
\nothers. Recently, she received an offer from the Indonesian
\nInstitute of Arts (ISI) to lecture on her new embroidery
\ntechnique.<\/p>\n
\"I'm glad (about the offer), but I have not been informed yet
\non when I would start teaching,\" Dewi said.<\/p>",
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