工艺之旅（英）

The folk handicraft arts of China are an important part of ancient Chinese culture and arts,They are characterized by long history,wide-ranging elements,many varieties,and unique styles.Let’s start our journey! 

在中国成千上万的手工艺中，本书仅从东西南北不同的地域和种类中选了二十多个品种。数量自然很少，但一滴水可以折射出璀璨的阳光，从中，我们能领略到中华手工的博大与精美。

Preface
Tuiguang Lacquer,a Thousand-year-old Craft of Pingyao,Shanxi
Copper Hotpot,a Unique Handicraft of Datong,Shanxi
Paper-cut,a Colorful Folk Art
Woodblock New Year Paintings
The Fish-skin Clothing and Adornments of Hezhen Ethnic Group
The Tricolor Pottery of Luoyang,Henan
The Brocade of Tujia Ethnic Group
Cotton Print of Fenghuang Town by Tuojiang River
The Indigo Print Cloth of Wuzhen，Zhejiang
The Clay Figurines of Huishan，Jiangsu
The Puppets of Quanzhou,Fujian
The Wood Carvings of Dongyang,Zhejiang
Weifang,City of Kites
The Clothing and Personal Adornments of the Dong Ethnic Group
Sichuan Embroidery
Sichuan Candy Pictures,an“Edible Art”
The Art of Processing Three Gorges Stones 94
The Bamboo Screen Paintings of Liangping County,Chongqing
Thangka of the Tibetans,an Integration of Religion and Art
Hepo,a Handicraft Township in the Hengduan Mountain
The Paper Horse of Tengchong,an Ornate and Magical Art
The Tile Cats of Yunnan
The Masks of Field Opera in Guizhou
The Silhouette Shows of Huanxian,Gansu
The Perfumed Bags of Qingyang,Gansu
The Jade Carving of Hotan,Xinjiang

PrefaceThe folk handicraft arts of China are an important part of ancient Chinese culture and arts. They are characterized by long history, wide-ranging elements, many varieties, and unique styles.Many of China’s folk arts have a history going back as far as 1,000 years and even thousands of years, for instance, the colored pottery and jade ware of the Neolithic Age and the woodcut fish of the Hemudu Period more than 7,000 years ago. China’s folk arts are a continuation of the primitive arts, the contents and decorative patterns having retained traces of those times. The folk paper-cuts and embroidery contain many designs that originated from primitive totems. Following the times, different styles have emerged in China’s folk arts. The bronze ware, lacquer ware, brocade, porcelain ware and so on, each with its own style and bearing, possess exquisite craftsmanship and extraordinary concepts, illustrating the wisdom and talent of China’s ancestors.Folk arts encompass aspects of clothing, food, housing, and transportation, and their defining feature involves combining practicality with beauty—satisfying the material needs of the people and their pursuit of aesthetics. So, China’s folk arts are simultaneously creations of material and spiritual culture.The folk arts have distinct regional features. China has a vast territory with great differences in geological conditions, climate, environment, and products. The development of the cultural formations also varies. For instance, China’s southwest produces bamboo and rattan in abundance and their braided products mostly consist of bamboo ware and rattan ware, while north China produces these with wheat stalks and sorghum. The climate in the south is temperate and moist and the garment materials often consist of cloth, ramie (also known as China grass) and silk, while the north is cold and the garment materials mostly consist of leather, felt, wool, etc. Even with the same material and the same handicraft, characteristics differ because of differences in region, culture, and customs, such as the several kinds of paper-cuts and woodblock New Year paintings discussed in this book.China’s folk handicraft arts bear out the rich cultures and customs of the country, which are closely related. We may say that China’s folk customs form the ecological environment for the formation and development of its folk handicraft arts. For instance, it is believed among the Chinese people that the tiger is the king of all animals, and the common people would make “tiger head shoes,” shoes with their head in the shape of a tiger head. When a baby grows to about one year old, the elders would put tiger head shoes on the feet of the baby in the hope that these will drive out ghosts and evil spirits and the child would grow strong and spirited. Through each specific handicraft, whether its paper-cut, embroidery, New Year painting, paper horse, Thangka or tile cat, the reader may get the feel of the rich and colorful folk arts developed in the soil of this agricultural civilization.Of the tens of thousands of handicrafts, only 20 varieties have been chosen from the different regions to share here. Naturally the number is limited, yet just as the saying goes that even one drop of water can reflect the gorgeous sun-light, similarly one can get an idea of the vastness and exquisiteness of Chinese handicrafts.It is an enjoyable thing for one to travel around China and appreciate the long history and profound culture contained in the handcrafted artifacts. From the gorgeous Tuiguang lacquer in Shanxi to the beautiful fish-skin clothes and adornments of Hezhen ethnic group, from the elegant tricolor pottery to the charming indigo print cloth, from the exquisite embroidery of Sichuan to the perfumed bags of Gansu…North China, Northeast China, Central China, East China, Southwest China, and Northwest China, let’s start our journey!

The Puppets of Quanzhou, FujianIn southeast Fujian Province, Quanzhou faces Taiwan Island across the Taiwan Strait. Quanzhou is a city with exquisite scenery, beautiful mountains, rivers, numerous tourist resorts and cultural relics. As far back as the Tang Dynasty, it was one of China’s four foreign trading ports and the starting point of the Silk Road on the sea with a unique human geography and a long history of business and trade and rich cultural development.The monolithic statue of Laozi, founder of Taoism, and the local dramas and martial arts have imbued this city with traditional culture and native flavor. Meanwhile, foreign influences can be found everywhere. There are China’s earliest Islamic mosques, and the world’s only surviving stone sculpture of a Manichaeism Buddhist.Another wonderful art is the puppetr y of the most charming city of Quanzhou.It is said that puppetry originated in the Han Dynasty and became prosperous in the Tang Dynasty; the wooden puppet of Quanzhou has a long history of over 2,000 years. At first, it evolved from figurines of musicians and dancers that were buried with the dead. After the Northern Qi Dynas t y (550–577), they were used in song and dance performances in contemplating stories as a companion to the dramas. The wooden puppet of Quanzhou has kept the rich artistic traditions and exquisite performances, and they are well-known. They can be divided into stringdrawn puppets and palm puppets.Among the wooden puppets of Quanzhou the most famous are the string-drawn puppets, which belong to a rare ancient theatrical variety known as “suspended silk puppets” or “thread plays” popular in south Fujian Province.With regard to string-drawn puppets is this interesting story: Liu Bang, Emperor Gaozu (256–195 BC), was surrounded at Pingcheng (Datong of Shanxi Province of today) by the army of King Modu (?–174 BC) of the Huns, whose strong troops were led by his wife Yanzhi. After over a month, the Han army in Pingcheng ran out of supplies and Liu Bang was extremely anxious. When Lieutenant Chen Ping of Liu Bang’s army learned that Modu was fond of women and that his wife Yanzhi was very jealous, he ordered mechanics in the army to make many wooden figurines of beautiful women—each attached with several silk threads —and ordered the soldiers to carry the puppet beauties to dance at the openings of the city wall. The puppet beauties were graceful and attractive. Yanzhi mistook them for real beauties and worried that after conquering the city her husband would choose the beauties to be his concubines. She ordered her troops to withdraw and as a result the besiegement was broken. In recognition of the meritorious service of the puppet beauties, Liu Bang granted to them titles of high-ranking imperial concubines and collected them in the imperial warehouse as state treasures. By the time of Emperor Wendi, the Music Office of the imperial household made copies of the puppets and gave performances with them.