Tang Xian
Paper was invented in the Western Han Dynasty (6th century BC). Before that, there could be no paper-cutting art. But at that time, people used very thin materials to make handicrafts by hollowing out and carving, but it was popular long before paper appeared, that is, patterns were cut on gold foil, leather, silk and even leaves by carving, carving, picking, carving and cutting.
According to Records of the Historian Jiantong Di Feng, in the early years of the Western Zhou Dynasty, the leaves of the pole were cut into "poles" and given to his younger brother, who was named Tang Hou. During the Warring States period, leather carvings (one of the cultural relics unearthed from Chu Tomb No.1 in Jiangling, Hubei Province) and silver foil carvings (one of the cultural relics unearthed from the Warring States site in Guwei Village, Huixian County, Henan Province) were all demolished together with paper-cutting, and their appearance laid a certain foundation for the formation of folk paper-cutting.
In the Northern and Southern Dynasties, there was a poem "Painting Yellow on the Mirror" in Mulan Ci. China's earliest paper-cut works are found in five paper-cuts of the Northern Dynasty (AD 386-58 1 year) unearthed near the Flame Mountain in Turpan, Xinjiang. These paper-cuts are folded repeatedly, and the images are not covered with each other.
the Tang Dynasty
Paper-cutting has been in a period of great development in the Tang Dynasty. In Du Fu's poem Peng ADB, there is a saying that "warm soup is enough for me and paper is enough for my soul", and the custom of evoking souls by paper-cutting has been circulated among the people at that time. The paper-cut in the Tang Dynasty, which is now in the British Museum, shows that the paper-cut at that time had a high level of manual art and a complete picture composition, expressing an ideal realm between heaven and earth.
Popular in the Tang Dynasty, the carved patterns of flowers and trees have the characteristics of paper-cutting. For example, the pattern of "Duiyang" in Masakura Hospital in Japan is a typical artistic expression of hand cutting. In the Tang dynasty, there was also block printing made of paper-cutting. People carved it into wax paper with thick paper, and then printed the dye on the cloth to form beautiful patterns.
In addition, paper-cuts from the Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties, such as Twin Deer Pagoda, Pagoda and Deer Pagoda, were unearthed in Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes. , which belongs to the category of "merit paper", is mainly used to worship Buddha statues and decorate temples and Dojo. Its picture composition is complex and its content is specific, and there are ink paintings such as "Bodhisattva" and "Embracing Bodhisattva", which are works of paper-cutting and painting.
Song dynasty
During the Southern Song Dynasty, professional artists took paper-cutting as their profession. According to Song people's careful "Old Wulin Stories", there were hundreds of "small economies" in Hangzhou at this time. Among them, there are those who specialize in "cutting patterns", those who are good at cutting "words of various families" and those who specialize in cutting "various colors".
In Song Dynasty, the paper industry was mature and there were many kinds of paper products, which provided conditions for the popularization of paper-cutting. Such as "fireworks" as folk gifts, "window grilles" stuck on windows, or decorations for lanterns and teacups [8]. The application scope of folk paper-cutting in Song Dynasty gradually expanded. Jiangxi Jizhou Kiln uses paper-cut as the pattern of ceramics, and makes the ceramics more exquisite by glazing and firing. Folk also use paper-cutting to carve figures in shadow play with the skins of animals such as donkeys, cows, horses and sheep. Carved version made of blue printed cloth, carved into patterns with oilpaper board, and scratched patterns made by paper-cutting technology, divided into yin and yang engraving. Long queues should be cut off to distinguish facts from truth.
Ming and Qing dynasties
During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the paper-cut handicraft art matured and reached its peak. Folk paper-cut handicraft art has a wider range of applications, such as flower decorations on folk lanterns, decorative patterns on fans and embroidery patterns, all of which are reprocessed with paper-cut as decoration. More people in China often use paper-cutting as decorations to decorate their homes and beautify their home environment. For example, door battlements, window grilles, cabinet flowers, wedding flowers and ceiling flowers are all used to decorate doors, windows and rooms.
Although the art of paper-cutting came from the people, it became a national art in the Qing Dynasty, and even the royal family and the country at that time could not do without paper-cutting.
The Kunning Palace in the Forbidden City in Beijing is the wedding bridal chamber of the Qing emperor. According to Manchu custom, the window paper of the front and rear windows of the palace is pasted outside. Wallpaper is pasted on the wall, the four corners are black "Xi" paper-cut corner flowers, and the center of the ceiling is black dragon and phoenix paper-cut. Paper-cuts are also posted on the walls of the aisles on both sides of the palace. Judging from the pattern, material and color of paper-cutting, compared with the ceiling flowers and wall flowers of ordinary farmers, there is basically no difference except that the pattern of paper-cutting is slightly larger.
Modern Times
At the beginning of the 20th century, with the advocacy of advanced intellectuals such as Cai Yuanpei, Lu Xun, Liu Bannong and Zhou Zuoren, the May 4th New Culture Movement laid the embryonic form of China folklore. They widely collect folk literature and materials, and also try to collect folk art works, including folk paper-cutting. In 1930s, the artist Chen Zhinong started the research and creation of folk paper-cutting in Beijing. In the form of sketches and silhouettes, he described a large number of local conditions and customs in old Beijing, such as street vendors, workshop craftsmen, food stalls and tea pickers, fairs and temple fairs, and idle people in markets.
In the 1940s, paper-cutting with real life as its theme began to appear.
1942, Mao Zedong's speech at Yan 'an Forum on Literature and Art pointed out the literary policy of "literature and art serve the workers, peasants and soldiers". Since then, artists from Lu Yi, Yan 'an, such as Chen Shuliang, Zhang Ding, Li Qun, Gu Yuan, Xia Feng, etc., began to learn local folk paper-cuts with a deep mass base, collected, excavated, sorted out and studied folk paper-cuts, and created a large number of new paper-cuts reflecting the production, life and fighting of the people in the border areas. The works adopt the traditional folk style and describe the new contents of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the border area construction. It promoted the emergence and development of mass paper-cutting and innovated the traditional folk paper-cutting.
During the period of 1944, the northwest folk new paper-cut works were exhibited in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia border region for the first time, which opened the prelude to the development of paper-cut art after the founding of New China. It can be said that Yan 'an paper-cutting has created a new era of Chinese paper-cutting.
After the founding of New China, under the guidance of the literary policy of "letting a hundred flowers blossom and bringing forth the new", artists have created a large number of new paper-cuts to express new socialist people and new things, which has opened up the way for paper-cutting creation and enriched the form and content of Chinese folk decorative arts. In the creation of new paper-cutting, children, sports, acrobatics, singing and dancing have also become the most common themes of paper-cutting.
Paper-cut art has never been interrupted in the history of China since its birth. It is rich in various folk activities, and it is one of the richest art forms in China folk history and culture.
The Development History of Paper-cutting
Paper-cutting (also called paper engraving) is one of the oldest folk arts in China, which gives people an empty inspiration and artistic enjoyment visually. The carrier of paper-cutting can be paper, gold and silver foil, bark, leaves, cloth and leather. On May 20th, 2006, the paper-cut art heritage was approved by the State Council to be included in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage list. China folk paper-cut handicraft art has its own formation and development process. The invention of Chinese paper-cutting was in the Western Han Dynasty (3rd century BC). At that time, people used very thin materials to make handicrafts by hollowing out and carving, but it was popular long before paper appeared, that is, patterns were cut on gold foil, leather, silk and even leaves by carving, carving, picking, carving and cutting. According to Records of the Historian Jiantong Di Feng, in the early years of the Western Zhou Dynasty, a king claimed the title of king, and cut a plane tree leaf into a "reed" and gave it to his younger brother, who was named Hou in the Tang Dynasty. During the Warring States Period, leather carvings (one of the cultural relics unearthed from Chu Tomb No.1 in Jiangling, Hubei Province) and silver foil carvings (one of the cultural relics unearthed from Guwei Village in Huixian County, Henan Province) were all demolished together with paper-cutting, and their appearance laid a certain foundation for the formation of folk paper-cutting. The earliest paper-cutting works in China were found in 1967, when China archaeologists discovered two paper-cuts with flowers in the northern tombs of Astana near Gaochang Site in Turpan Basin, Xinjiang. They use hemp paper, all of which are folded sacrificial paper-cuts. Their discovery provides physical evidence for the formation of Chinese paper-cutting.
The history of paper-cutting handicraft art, that is, paper-cutting in the true sense, should begin with the appearance of paper. The invention of paper in Han Dynasty promoted the appearance, development and popularization of paper-cutting. Paper is a moldy material. People don't keep it as a treasure, and they can cut it if it is broken. In the northwest of China, the weather is dry, the climate is dry, and the paper is not easy to get moldy, which may also be one of the important reasons for the discovery of paper-cutting in the Northern Dynasties in Turpan, Xinjiang.
Paper-cutting has been in a period of great development in the Tang Dynasty. In Du Fu's poem, there is a saying that "warm water trapped my feet, and paper-cutting called back my soul", and the custom of paper-cutting called back my soul had spread among the people at that time. The paper-cut in the Tang Dynasty, which is now in the British Museum, shows that the paper-cut at that time had a high level of manual art and a complete picture composition, expressing an ideal realm between heaven and earth. Popular in the Tang Dynasty, the carved patterns of flowers and trees have the characteristics of paper-cutting. For example, the pattern of "Duiyang" in Masakura Hospital in Japan is a typical artistic expression of hand cutting. In the Tang Dynasty, there were also stencil printing plates made by paper cutting. People carve templates with thick paper, and then print dyes on the cloth to form very beautiful patterns.
In Song Dynasty, the paper industry was mature and there were many kinds of paper products, which provided conditions for the popularization of paper-cutting. For example, it can be used as "fireworks" for folk gifts, "window grilles" pasted on windows, or as decorations for lanterns and teacups. The application scope of folk paper-cutting in Song Dynasty gradually expanded. Jiangxi Jizhou Kiln uses paper-cut as the pattern of ceramics, and makes the ceramics more exquisite by glazing and firing. Folk also use paper-cutting to carve figures in shadow play with the skins of animals such as donkeys, cows, horses and sheep. Carved version made of blue printed cloth, carved into patterns with oilpaper board, and scratched patterns made by paper-cutting technology, divided into yin and yang engraving. Long queues should be cut off to distinguish facts from truth. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the paper-cut handicraft art matured and reached its peak. Folk paper-cut handicraft art has a wider range of applications, such as flower decorations on folk lanterns, decorative patterns on fans and embroidery patterns, all of which are reprocessed with paper-cut as decoration. What's more, China people often use paper-cutting as decoration to beautify the home environment, such as doorjambs, window grilles, cabinet flowers, wedding flowers and ceiling flowers, which are all used to decorate doors, windows and rooms. In addition to the paper-binding pattern craftsmen who appeared after the Southern Song Dynasty, the most basic team of folk paper-cutting handicrafts in China is rural women. Female red is an important symbol of the perfection of traditional women in China. As a compulsory skill of needlework, paper-cutting has become a skill that girls have to learn since childhood. They want to learn paper-cut patterns from their predecessors or sisters, cut out new patterns through cutting, re-cutting, painting and cutting, and describe the natural scenery they are familiar with and love, the scenery of fish, insects, birds, beasts, flowers, trees, pavilions and bridges, and finally reach the realm of their will.