Teochew woodcarving

Name of China's national intangible cultural heritage: Chaozhou woodcarving

Applicant: Chaozhou City, Guangdong Province

Project No.: 339

Project No.: Ⅶ - 40

Time of publication: 2006 (the first batch)

Category: traditional art

Region: Guangdong Province

Type: new item

Applicant: Chaozhou City, Guangdong Province

Protection unit: Xiangqiao District Cultural Center of Chaozhou City (Xiangqiao District Library of Chaozhou City)

Introduction to Chaozhou wood carving

Applicant: Chaozhou City, Guangdong Province

Chaozhou wood carving is a folk carving art in Chaozhou area of Guangdong Province. It is mainly used to decorate buildings, furniture and sacrificial utensils. This skill is mainly popular in Lianshang village and Xidu village, Yixi Town, Xiangqiao District, Chaozhou City. It also affects Raoping, Shantou, Chaoyang, Jieyang, JieXi, Puning, Lufeng, Dapu, Wuhua, Xingning, Meixian and other counties and cities in Southeast Fujian Province.

It is not known when Chaozhou wood carving began. There is a "grass tail" decorated bucket arch on the beam frame of Tianwang Hall of Kaiyuan Temple in Chaozhou, which is a relic of the Tang Dynasty, while the wooden dragon hanging a bronze bell is a relic of the Song Dynasty. Xu Fu Ma's mansion in Chaozhou was built during the reign of Zhiping in the Northern Song Dynasty. Its architectural decoration and wood carvings are mainly "grass tail". It can be seen that Chaozhou wood carving existed in Tang and Song dynasties. By the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Chaozhou's wood carving techniques had reached perfection. At the end of Ming Dynasty, the art of grottoes basically stopped, and the major monasteries made more wood carvings, such as Buddha statues, Buddhist utensils and desk tables, and multi-layer carving technology appeared. Chaozhou woodcarving and Dongyang woodcarving are both famous for their multi-layer carving. Many woodcarvings are decorated with gold foil and set off by black lacquer or multicolor. The former is called "black gold", while the latter is called "multicolor gold". There are also the use of "natural color plain carving", in order to achieve the effect of simple and unadorned. Built in the 13th year of the reign of Emperor Guangxu of the Qing Dynasty, Chaozhou Jiliao Huanggong ancestral hall, a national key cultural relic protection unit, is decorated with auspicious animals such as dragons, phoenixes and lions on its beams and columns. It shows various performance techniques of Chaozhou wood carvings and is known as "a unique piece of Chaozhou wood carvings". In the early years of the Republic of China, with the rise of Chaozhou merchants, temples, ancestral halls and luxury houses became popular. Under this background, woodcarvers used Southeast Asian mahogany to create "mahogany square" and "Ruyi clogs", forming a new style of exquisite, dignified and luxurious wood carving.

Chaozhou wood carvings are mostly made of camphor wood with moderate toughness. There are many kinds of carving forms, such as relief carving, sinking carving, round carving, carving and through carving. The finished products are exquisitely carved and rich in layers. In a piece of carving, Chaozhou wood carving is often arranged in zigzag shape, and the zigzag and continuous stories are cleverly divided into different pictures by using landscape pavilions, so that the characters are complex but not chaotic, and the plot is vivid and orderly. Because of the view of the viewer, the wood carving decoration at the high end of the citron beam often exaggerates some parts of the characters, such as the eyes deepened, the nose heightened, and the mouth protruded. It's just right to look up. In terms of composition, Chaozhou woodcarving either imitates traditional Chinese painting or opera stage. Its characteristic is that it expresses the stories happened in different time and space at the same time on one woodcarving surface. Its narrative way has the so-called "path" (dealing with the context of characters' activities in a special way of composition). The most eye-catching decorative design of Chaozhou wood carving is the door, which is divided into the top horizontal belly, Fanglan, doors and windows, enterprise belly, middle horizontal belly, big belly and lower horizontal belly and other decorative parts. The theme, form and technique of each part are different. In addition to architectural decorative carvings, Chaozhou wood carvings can also be used to make artifact decorations such as Pavilion, sedan chair, box, stove cover, Candlestick, fruit dish, etc. Its carving forms are generally divided into three types: sunken carving, relief carving, general carving and round carving. Due to the wide distribution of areas, there are local style differences. As far as Chaoshan and Xingmei areas are concerned, the layout of wood carvings in Chaoshan area is complex, the structure is tight, and the details are delicate, which is good at showing the continuous plot; the knife technique of wood carvings in Xingmei area is concise, and there are not many characters, which is characterized by highlighting the main plot. Huang Kaixian once appeared in Chaozhou woodcarving industry in the late Qing Dynasty, and won a reputation for his superb skills. Zhang Jianxuan and Chen shunqiang are the famous woodcarvers who inherit this art in modern times. Zhang Jianxuan thinks that Chaozhou woodcarving art can be summed up into six words: "even, miscellaneous, Tongtong." even "refers to the primary and secondary distinction between the virtual and the real," miscellaneous "refers to the level and the interpenetration," Tongtong "refers to the clear. Due to the change of modern living environment, Chaozhou wood carving has lost its original conditions of dependence. In addition, the traditional folk customs are weakening day by day, and the shrines, God pavilions and other items are fading out of daily life. Therefore, the use of Chaozhou wood carving is decreasing day by day. On the other hand, Chaozhou wood carving has fine craftsmanship, difficult creation, many processing procedures, and manual operation. It is hard and unable to form large-scale production, resulting in poor economic benefits. Therefore, there are fewer and fewer people engaged in wood carving processing and production, especially the young generation, who are reluctant to engage in this work. This leads to Chaozhou wood carving in a situation of lack of successors, which is in urgent need of rescue and support.

Chinese PinYin : Chao Zhou Mu Diao