A century-old legend of Fuzhou cork painting staged a new wonderful performance.

Spring on the Wood, Showing the Min Charm

-A century-old legend of Fuzhou cork painting staged a new wonderful performance.

Evergreen, a creative product of cork painting designed by Guo Li

Photo from Fuzhou Art Museum

Wu Bao's cork painting "The Wonder of Tulou"

Photographed by Zhang Xuyang

Chen Junkun's cork painting Ancient Pine Tree

Photo from interviewee

Walking through Shangxiahang historical and cultural blocks in Fuzhou, Fujian Province, there are a lot of tourists in Fuzhou Intangible Cultural Heritage Exhibition Hall, the popular place of online celebrity. Among the dazzling exhibits, the cork painting, known as "Danqing on the blade and in the wood", attracts people to visit. If you want to take exquisite cork paintings home, you can go to journey to the south, Fuzhou Cork Painting Museum in the historical and cultural block of 3 Lanes and 7 Alleys. There are a wide variety of cork paintings and cultural and creative products, and you can get a close look at their charm. If you want to know where the skill of cork painting comes from, you only need to go further north. In Xiyuan Village, where cork painting originated, a intangible cultural heritage demonstration base has been established. Here, the century-old legend of Fuzhou cork painting is playing a new and wonderful role.

Danqing in the Wood: Turning Decadence into Magic

Rich bookish spirit is one of the characteristics of Fujian's traditional handicrafts, showing the unique literati aesthetic fashion of Fujian's creations. Cork painting is the painters' flowers on the plain wood.

More than 100 years ago, a wooden greeting card from Europe was handed to local artisans by Fuzhou officials, and woodcarving technician Wu Qiqi and others were ordered to develop new products based on it. After many explorations, craftsmen locked the materials into Quercus variabilis from countries along the Mediterranean coast. Quercus variabilis, commonly known as cork oak tree, can be made into cork with soft and fine texture and soft color. In foreign countries, cork is often used as practical products such as wine stoppers. In China, craftsmen slice cork into thin slices with superb skills, carve flowers, trees, pavilions, etc. with Chinese aesthetic charm according to the composition and modeling of traditional Chinese paintings, and then paste these elements together according to the landscaping of Chinese gardens, creating "silent poems and three-dimensional paintings"-cork paintings.

Using a knife as a a pen, the combination of "carving" and "painting" made the cork painting break through successfully. The craftsmen realized the artistic effect of "hundreds of miles of mountains in one frame" through the technique of "shrinking". Miniature landscape, condensed with culture and skills. Fuzhou's woodcarving and stone carving skills are developed, and the craftsmen of cork painting are eclectic with their ingenuity. Under the comprehensive application of various techniques, cork painting can be as thin as cicada's wings, as thin as hair, and exquisite, complicated and magnificent. The traditional landscape painting's layout, image modeling, expression techniques, etc. have also been skillfully used for reference and transformed by craftsmen. For example, the composition pays attention to proper density and combination of virtual and real, and some parts of the picture are often left blank to create an ethereal artistic conception, which highlights the beautiful freehand brushwork of mountains and rivers.

Retain the sense of texture and beauty of cork itself, and achieve the quiet and elegant artistic charm of cork painting. Chen Junkun, the provincial representative inheritor of cork painting, thinks, "Cork is spiritual, that is, it is full of the beauty of natural life". In order to produce fine cork paintings, generations of inheritors have devoted a lot of efforts from the beginning of material selection. The texture and color of wood all affect the effect of cork painting. Only about 100 kg of materials can be selected from 2 tons of raw wood. Behind the exquisite use of materials is the unique aesthetic view of Chinese culture, which advocates the beauty of nature and pursues the idea of applying art according to materials.

Because of its unique aesthetic feeling and exquisite craftsmanship, cork painting, Shoushan stone carving and bodiless lacquer ware, which have a long history, are called "three treasures" of Fuzhou arts and crafts, and once became a "star" product of Fujian's foreign exports, and were exported to dozens of countries and regions. “Flowers” on the woods spread the beauty of Chinese culture to the world.

Min Charm: expanding sketch into a giant system

The founder laid the unique national style of cork painting, while the successors gave it a strong sense of the times and regional characteristics.

Wu Xuebao, 82, is a master of Chinese arts and crafts and a representative inheritor of "Cork Painting", a national intangible cultural heritage representative project. From the age of 7, he followed his father Wu Qiqi to learn how to make cork paintings. In the 1950s, Fuzhou Craft Wood Painting Factory was established in Xiyuan Village, and the skills of cork painting were greatly improved. The production skills of flat card and thin carved hanging frame works became more mature, and the semi-three-dimensional relief cork painting came into being. Since then, after several explorations, artisans have used the principle of round carving and through carving techniques to create the first round-cover landscape three-dimensional cork painting, thus realizing the artistic leap. The form is rich enough, how to expand the content? How to express real scenery and real life? As the second generation successor, Wu Xuebao boldly accepted the challenge and took on the creative task of the work West Lake in Fuzhou. After numerous on-the-spot observations and innovations in comprehensive application of various carving techniques, the works successfully passed the acceptance and entered the Great Hall of the People, laying the foundation for the development of cork painting from folk craft to special craft. Since then, Wu Xuebao has created a series of works with Fujian landscape as the theme, such as Tulou Wonder, Fuzhou Yushan Dingguang Tower, Wuyi Scenery, and other large-scale thematic works such as The Great Wall. Folk cork painting, writing a new chapter of large-scale theme creation.

As a kind of arts and crafts characterized by elaborate carving and picturesque painting, small-scale cork painting still needs craftsmen's painstaking efforts and painstaking techniques, and the creation of large-scale cork painting tests the skill and ingenuity of craftsmen. Wu Xuebao, who has been engaged in cork painting since childhood, knows well the artistic advantages of cork painting and is committed to enlarging it constantly. In his decades of artistic career, he went deep into his life, continued to study Chinese excellent traditional culture, improved the artistic taste of cork painting by imitating the artistic conception of Song painting, and enhanced the expressive force of cork painting by constantly innovating techniques. For example, in the creation of Landscape, he integrated wood carving and stone carving techniques, which made the work present the artistic effect of three-dimensional carving and double-sided carving. When he created The Great Wall, he used the technique of "framed scenery" in Chinese gardens for reference, innovatively used plexiglass as a lining, and solved the problem of multi-level layout of cork paintings in distant mountains and close range. When he created The Wonder of Tulou, he used the perspective of Chinese and Western paintings, concentrated the Tulou and the mountains in a hanging frame in a patchwork way, and showed a spectacular Tulou style … With the pen intention of Song people, starting from the traditional artistic conception and looking at the mountains and rivers of the motherland, Wu Xuebao constantly broadened the artistic space of cork painting.

The fusion of "carver" and "painting scene", the fusion of traditional craft and foreign materials, and the fusion of national style and regional characteristics endow cork painting with special vitality. The fusion and innovation facing the times has become an important factor to promote the subsequent development of cork painting.

Reproduction of vitality: turning intangible heritage into literary creation

Cork painting once disappeared from people's vision. In the new century, the making skills of cork painting have been listed in the list of national intangible cultural heritage representative projects and the first batch of national traditional craft revitalization lists. In the alternation of prosperity and decline, endangered skills finally regain their brilliance.

Soft and porous cork not only endows cork painting with unique aesthetic connotation, but also sets an invisible threshold for the creation and sale of cork painting. Cork itself has natural holes, which determines that cork painting can only be created by artificial carving to avoid material defects, and the production process is extremely complicated. Although handicrafts are increasingly valued for their unique temperature, the value of handicrafts is jointly determined by materials and skills. Compared with other valuable woods, cheap cork determines that there is bound to be a gap between the hard work and income of cork painting practitioners. Nowadays, in Fuzhou, there are less than 30 new and old artists who specialize in the creation of cork paintings, and even fewer "all-round" craftsmen who master the complete production process. It takes time and effort, but the income is not high, which makes many people flinch from engaging in cork painting.

In order to effectively solve the problems in the inheritance and development of cork painting, a series of local policies have been issued. According to any Wei, deputy director of Fujian Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center, the provincial and municipal legislative protection has achieved remarkable results. In particular, the “Regulations on the Protection of Cork Paintings in Fuzhou” issued in 2021 has stimulated the development vitality of cork paintings: strengthening the training of talents, giving certain subsidies to young artists and apprentices in life and study, encouraging graduates of domestic fine arts institutes to start businesses, and allowing more young people to join the team of cork paintings; The establishment of Fuzhou West Park Cork Painting Association and Fuzhou Intangible Cultural Heritage Project Inheritance Demonstration Base set up a long-term platform for the inheritance, protection and development of cork painting; The display or sales outlets of cork paintings set up in historical and cultural blocks such as 3 Lanes and 7 Alleys, Shangxiahang and so on have promoted the spread of cork painting making skills...

Inheriting people is the hope of the development of cork painting. A group of young people, represented by Guo Li, the fifth generation inheritor of Fuzhou cork painting and the post-80s generation, focus on fashion as well as practicality, combine cork painting with Shoushan stone carving and bodiless lacquer ware to launch a new work that integrates the beauty of the three; integrate cork painting into creative design, and develop ornamental and practical lighting, tea trays, etc., explore lightweight and portable design, develop creative writing and accompanying gifts of cork painting… As Yu Weiping, president of Fujian Academy of Arts and Crafts, said, innovation of cork painting is no longer superficial change of scenery style, but lighting up life with creativity.

Nowadays, in large-scale exhibitions and competitions around the world, there are more and more craftsmen of cork paintings. New topics of cork painting can always lead to discussion at the gathering of new and old artists. On the Internet, short videos and animations based on cork paintings are not only "moving" but also more popular. Rooted in Chinese excellent traditional culture and continuously integrated into modern life, “flowers” on the plain wood will bloom and its fragrance will spread far and wide. (Wu Yanli and Ma Suwei)

People's Daily (08th edition, September 04, 2022)