Ancient textiles are very rare because they only survive in certain environments (either very hot and dry or waterlogged) but enough survive that we know that people were printing on fabric in East Asia in prehistory and in Egypt from at least the 4th century BC.
Early printing was block-printing, which is attested from pre-Christian times in China, Egypt, the East-Indies and Assyria, and dyes would be used to transfer images. Dyeing and elaborate weaving was far more common, but simple patterns continued to be printed into medieval times.
New techniques in printing only appeared in the 18th century, when copperplate and cylinder printing came into use. Patterns would be carved into a plate or roller to be transfered onto fabric. Thomas Bell patented a process of roller printing in 1783 which could print 6 colours at once, but the process was out of use by the 19th century as more suitable materials were used in place of copperplate. The process was popular because it was fast and produced elegant results far more quickly than block printing, which involved carefully lining up the edges of a block.
Machines also made an impact on block printing; in 1834, Perrot of Rouen invented a mechanical block printing machine, now known as a perrotine, that sped up the process considerably. It is the only totally practical machine made for the process and as such is still used in Europe today despite roller printing and screen printing becoming more popular.
Screen printing is the most common form of textile printing used today but is a relatively modern invention, first patented in 1907, although there is evidence to suggest that it was in use in China in the 9th century. In the West it was first used to create wallpaper designs and other paper crafts but by the 1920s fabrics were printed as well. Rotary multicoloured screen printing was patented in the 1960s by Michael Vasilantone, making large-scale screen prints faster and more viable. Advances in computer technology have meant that artists can now make more elaborate stencils in a manner similar to a digital printer (using cyan, magenta, yellow and black to build colours).
Digital Textile Printing or direct to garment (DTG) printing is the most recent addition, and is widely used now thanks to advances in technology. Ink is transfered directly onto the garment by an inkjet printer. These can create elaborate images swiftly but are expensive to purchase and maintain, so many artists and small production houses continue to use manual methods.
More links about printing
http://textiles.indianetzone.com/1/techniques_textile_decoration.htm - processes and history
http://www.artelino.com/articles/silkscreen-printing.asp - processes
http://www.pneac.org/printprocesses/screen/ more processes
http://thetextileblog.blogspot.com/search/label/printed and here's some of what the Textile Blog have on printed works, you can see just how versatile printing is from the huge range of different styles.
I really enjoy this post. In fact, it is not sure when the textile printing was started but it is assumed that East Indian area of China is the home of Textile Printing. Thanks for your sharing.
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