When Intangible Cultural Heritage Encounters Creativity, Tianjin's Traditional Leaf Carvings Revive New Vitality
2023-04-10
A small leaf carves out a vast world. Recently, at the Intangible Cultural Heritage Market held in Tianjin, Liu Xuexue, the inheritor of leaf carving techniques, successfully attracted a large number of fans with his fashionable and creative leaf carving works. The small western-style buildings on the Fifth Avenue, New Year paintings by Yang Liuqing, the twelve zodiac signs, calligraphy and painting, cartoon characters, and other trendy elements are vividly staged on small leaves, radiating extraordinary vitality. Leaf carving is a very ancient Paper Cuttings art with a history of 3000 years. According to historical records, leaf carving works first appeared in the early Western Zhou Dynasty. Between the square inches, the meridians are distinct, and after the leaves and flesh are chosen, a myriad of phenomena emerge, as if embedded within them. As the rudiment of Paper Cuttings culture, leaf carving contains ancient people. It borrows the wisdom of nature and reposes the leisure and romance of artisans. Tianjin craftsman Liu Xuexue demonstrated the characteristics of leaf carving, which is as flexible as cloth and constantly curved. Liu Juncang Photography Liu Society was born in a Paper Cuttings family. He told reporters that when he was a child, paper was relatively expensive. In order to learn Paper Cuttings, our children practice with leaves. As for the technique of Paper Cuttings, there is no big difference between paper and leaves. However, now that paper is readily available, leaf carving art has become more distinctive and seems to be a product of aesthetic progress and the times. Leaf carving usually uses the leaves of Fatong tree, which can be divided into dry carving and wet carving. When creating, it needs to go through dozens of processes, and use a variety of modern arts and crafts such as painting, micro carving, Paper Cuttings, calligraphy, seal cutting, etc. Especially in wet carving, the leaves undergo qualitative changes through the action of water, making the work as thin as cicada wings, with natural color, distinct muscles, and continuous curvature. Originally, making a complete leaf carving requires more than 30 processes in a purely manual state, including material selection, cleaning, soaking, drying, high-temperature steaming, design, drawing, carving, water absorption, drying, and wax spraying. The production process is quite complex and the cycle is relatively long. However, the key to an excellent work is the design of the pattern and the grasp of the relationship between black, white, and gray in the work. Liu Xuexue said that good works need to have a sense of hierarchy, and to master the heat and intensity. In the ever-changing world, finding one's own answer is completely a feeling. One of the characteristics of my works is that they are as thin as cicada wings; The second is that it will not rot for decades; Furthermore, it is as flexible as cloth, curved and continuous, even if folded, it will be fine. Liu Xuexue is using this "wet carving" technique to maintain the original characteristics of leaf carving while incorporating trendy elements such as small western-style buildings, willow youth paintings, and fashionable cartoon characters from Tianjin's Fifth Avenue, giving new vitality to traditional leaf carving. Even over the years, he has been constantly trying to incorporate his feelings for Tianjin into the leaf carving. Liu Xuexue pointed to his favorite leaf carving works, "Yang Liuqing New Year Painting Remains for Years" and "Great Hero Huo Yuanjia", and said, "These two works represent the 'one culture and one martial arts' of Xiqing District. As a Tianjin native, I want to make leaf carving with a Tianjin flavor." Tianjin craftsman Liu Xuexue demonstrated the leaf carving technique. In order to inherit the art of leaf carving, Liu Juncang, as the inheritor of the intangible cultural heritage of this craft, went deep into the school as soon as he had time to communicate with students and donate his skills. Through the form of "intangible cultural heritage+creativity", more and more young people became fond of leaf carving and inherited it. Liu Xue
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