The sign read Babaran Segaragunung Culture House. Ismoyo pulled the van over and Nia stepped out to unlock the gate. As she pulled both sides open, my eyes were filled with green—the gate, the wall, the fence, the brick—everything was painted in varying shades of green. Ismoyo pulled in and parked the car, and a man came out to take my luggage. He said nothing. I bowed. He disappeared into the garden.

Finally, I was at my artist-in-residency destination, the studio and home of husband and wife master batik artists Agus Ismoyo and Nia Fliam, in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. It was March 7, 2018, a year and a half after beginning my research, which was originally inspired by the exhibition "Weaver's Stories from Island Southeast Asia" at Asia Society Texas Center in Houston, Texas. —from Batiked Life!: Sabbatical Research on the Art of Batik by Mari Omori