The main material of paper-cutting is paper. Paper is one of China's four great inventions. It has always been recognized that papermaking was invented by Cai Lun around 105. Later, paper from the Western Han Dynasty was unearthed in Fufeng County, Shaanxi Province. Experts believe that paper appeared in China before Emperor Han Ping, probably during the period of Xuan Di (73 BC-49 BC). No matter what the final conclusion is, there will be no real paper-cutting before the invention of paper. However, other plates are used for cutting and carving, but before there is paper. Let's look at related cultural relics and historical records:
Warring States period (22 BC1)
① 1950- 1952 During the excavation of the Warring States site in Guwei Village, Huixian County, Henan Province, arc ornaments carved with silver foil were found.
(2) Gold ornaments of the Jin Dynasty unearthed in Huangniqi, Changsha, Hunan. Although these decorations hollowed out with silver foil can't be said to be paper-cut, they can be said to have formed the predecessor of paper-cut art in carving technology and artistic style.
Northern Dynasties (386-534 AD)
The paper was cut into beautiful patterns. At present, the earliest and most complete record is that five paper-cuts with flowers were unearthed near the Flame Mountain in Turpan, Xinjiang. Three schools:
Shandong folk paper-cutting:
Shandong folk paper-cut can be roughly divided into two categories from the modeling style.
One is the boldness of Bohai Bay, which is in the same strain as the paper-cutting in other provinces in the Yellow River Basin. One is the exquisite paper-cut with characteristics in the coastal area of Jiaodong, Shandong Province, which is mainly line-based and combines line and surface. It seems to come down in one continuous line with the subtle and complicated style of stone reliefs in the Han Dynasty in Shandong Province, and with its intensive decorative means, it makes the simple and refreshing appearance more full and rich.
Shandong Jiaodong called a woman with good skills a "liar". No matter which village she was in, people were proud of her. Their flower patterns are often spread around with fireworks on wallpaper, becoming the flower arrangement of villages far and near. The most common use of paper-cutting is to decorate windows. Most of the windows in Jiaodong are slender lattices, and generally only small flowers can be attached. Women give full play to their creativity, cut the big composition into strips by breaking it into parts, and then stick it on the window to form a complete picture. This kind of paper-cut called "crossing the window" is usually stuck on the "window center". There are also "horn flowers", "window flowers" and "cockfighting flowers" hanging in front of the window, which constitute a series of "inter-culture". In order to match the layout of holiday rooms, paper-cutting is also used to decorate walls and ceilings, as well as decals for utensils.
Since ancient times, Shandong paper-cutting has shown its unique aesthetic function more and more. Therefore, folk "magicians" who are good at juggling pay more attention to skills. Those broken lines and burrs as thin as mosquito's feet often make people feel a wonder that ordinary people can't achieve.
Anhui folk paper-cutting:
Anhui folk paper-cut formed a professional team of artists earlier, replacing ordinary aesthetic creation with its embryonic form of artistic commerce.
However, I have always believed that whether craftsman-style paper-cut works are folk or not depends mainly on the objects they serve. If it is based on the general level of workers' collective aesthetic consciousness, it is also attached to the category of folk art. Conversely, if you are already showing off your stunts to cater to the leisure of the aristocratic class, it is no different from the royal craftsmen hired in the palace to carve dragons and phoenixes to make wedding dresses for others. Most of the "gardeners" in Anhui belong to the former, and Cheng Jianli in Fuyang is the most representative one.
Cheng Jianli likes to cut flowers since he was a child and studies hard with his grandmother. He is very spiritual. At first, he arranged flowers for the villagers voluntarily. Later, he made a living by skill, picked flowers and swam around the rivers and lakes, and practiced a good craft, singing flower songs in his mouth and carving patterns ordered by women in his hand. For him, there is no need to think hard about the composition of the business, and he will start working when he has a plan. Any shape of paper has an image, just tap its spiritual door with scissors in your hand.
This is especially true of the "Trident" painting. The outline of the veranda is like a few natural strokes dipped in thick ink, but with a little care, two relatively burning eyes are cut out, "painting eyes" are cut just right, and "playing eyes" are also pointed out-the alert eyes of two people looking for each other in the dark.
Yangzhou folk paper-cutting:
Yangzhou is one of the earliest areas where paper-cutting is popular. During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, people regarded paper-cutting as a kind of fun, embellishing and beautifying life. Speaking of it, it has something to do with Emperor Yang Di Yang Guang. After Yang Guang proclaimed himself emperor, he began to build Yangzhou in the first year of Daye (605), and when Hangou was completed and the canal was opened to traffic, he built a large-scale branch library here. He has been to Yangzhou three times and had a good time.
In Shanglinyuan, west of Yangzhou, there are exotic flowers, exotic plants, rare birds and animals from all over the country. Whenever he takes the maid-in-waiting to the garden at night, he doesn't turn on the light, so many fireflies are caught and sent there. All over the mountains are fluorescent, as bright as day. In winter, the flowers and trees in the garden wither, the water in the pool freezes, and the wanderers of Emperor Yang are not reduced. However, ladies-in-waiting imitate folk paper-cutting, decorate branches with colorful brocade, hang them on trees, and cut them into lotus flowers, dragonflies and lotus roots. Remove the ice from the pool and arrange the water one by one, just like the gorgeous scenery at the turn of spring and summer, which is pleasing to the eye. This kind of "firefly garden" and "cut music", like "lost building" and "dragon boat", reflect the evil life of emperor Yang Di, but from the side of cutting the ribbon for flowers, Yangzhou paper-cutting has a long history.
In the Tang Dynasty, Yangzhou had the custom of paper-cutting to welcome the Spring. On the day of beginning of spring, folk paper-cuts are flowers, and they are also cut into spring butterflies, spring money and spring victory, "hanging on the top of a beauty or under a flower", which makes people feel happy. Li Shangyin, a poet in the Tang Dynasty, wrote the sentence "Carving gold to win the tradition, and cutting the ribbon to make people start the golden style", praising the beauty that paper-cutting is loved by people. At that time, paper-cutting was still superstitious. Yangzhou folk paper-cut people, paper horses and paper money are used to pay homage to ghosts and gods. Du Fu, a great poet, wrote in Peng ADB: "Warm soup is enough for me, and paper-cutting is enough for my soul", which is a reflection of this custom. 1980 In the spring, all walks of life in Yangzhou welcomed "Master Jian Zhen" back to his hometown to visit relatives. Yangzhou artists made a set of paper-cuts of Jian Zhen Da Monk, and Mr. Zhao Puchu wrote a poem "Recalling Jiangnan" for it, including the sentence "The moon sings all over the city, and the paper-cuts are magical and memorable". Love has inspired thousands of years of local customs, and the pen of genius has expressed his hometown.
The paper industry flourished in the Tang Dynasty, and there were large paper workshops in Yangzhou. During the Tang and Song Dynasties, a large number of high-quality tribute papers were produced. As a powerful material condition, it has also promoted the development of paper-cutting art. Since ancient times, there have been many exotic flowers and grasses in Yangzhou. Since the Tang and Song Dynasties, Yangzhou has been a satrap and poet, sending flowers and trees, decorating elegance, doing many things and writing many famous articles. This is an important factor in the theme of paper-cutting. Yangzhou paper-cut is dominated by flowers, which is indeed an important embodiment of the Millennium tradition.
Folk art influences, interacts and promotes each other. Yangzhou folk embroidery has an indissoluble bond with paper-cutting. First draw the embroidery pattern, cut it into paper, and then stick it on the cloth for embroidery. This method has lasted for a long time in Yangzhou, and it is still used in folk embroidery until now. Embroidery is also called embroidery. In the past, Yangzhou people always called paper-cut artists "cut flowers", which is due to the close relationship between the two arts.
In Qing Dynasty, Yangzhou brought prosperity to the city because of the development of salt industry in Jianghuai. Although salt merchants live in luxury, ordinary people also pay attention to clothes. Embroidery is the beauty of the room, from curtains to bedding pillowcases to mirror sachets and handkerchief pencil cases. As for weddings, birthdays and festivals, more embroidery patterns are used. These embroideries are based on paper cutting. Paper-cut artists use a pair of scissors and some plain paper to cut out vivid and auspicious patterns, so there are many folk artists who make a living by paper-cutting in Yangzhou. According to legend, during the reign of Jia Dao, the famous artist Bao Jun was famous for his exquisite skills. Under Baojun's scissors, flowers, birds, fish, insects and butterflies are all fascinating, because they have the reputation of "God scissors". At that time, people appreciated his cutting skills very much, and gave him a high evaluation of "Let him have a good spring breeze in February, it is better to cut weeping willows".
Methods: 1. Draft:
After the idea is determined, draft the layout, describe the picture in detail, and draw a black and white effect. The modified part can be white powder. For beginners, the finer the manuscript, the easier it is to carve. If you carve a symmetrical manuscript, you can draw half.
2. Cutting and carving:
If carving with a knife, the painting and paper must be nailed together, and the four corners should be fixed on the wax board. In order to ensure the accuracy of the image, people should carve the five senses first, flowers and birds should carve the details or key parts first, and then slowly carve them from the center to the periphery. The order of knives is like writing, from top to bottom, from left to right, from small to large, from fine to thick, from part to whole. Try to avoid repeated knife-cutting, the unnecessary parts must be cut off, and you can't tear them by hand, otherwise the paper-cutting will have burrs and affect the appearance.
3. Separation:
After the paper-cut is cut and carved, it needs to be uncovered one by one. Electro-optic paper and cotton wool paper are easy to uncover because of their smooth surfaces. Single-leaf rice paper and art paper are easy to stick together because they are light, moist and colored, and are not easy to uncover. Therefore, before uncovering the cover, you must rub the engraved cardboard gently to separate the papers from each other, and then gently uncover the first corner of the paper, and at the same time, blow air with your mouth to help.
4. Paste:
After peeling, paste the finished product for easy storage. There are two ways. First, put the paper-cut flat on the supporting paper and stick it from the inside out with a brush or thin wood chips dipped in paste. This method can't make all paper-cuts stick flat, which is slow and has the advantage of simplicity. The second is to put the paper-cut flat on the paper in reverse, then dip the diluted paste with a combination brush and gently brush it on the paper to be supported. Be careful not to wrinkle the paper brush. There must be less paste on the brush. Then, quickly fix the brushed paste on the back of the paper-cut, and gently flatten it by hand, so that all the paper-cuts are pasted on the paper holder. Gently lift, dry, clamp and save. Besides pasting, white latex can also be used as an adhesive.
5, finished product modification:
Sometimes you will use a knife when cutting, especially when cutting paper. If it is carved in a large area, it will not be easy to repair. If it is carved in a small area, it can be carved locally and replaced with a new one. Color paper-cut can't be covered if it is dyed wrong, and it has to be engraved and dyed again. Be sure to pay attention to the change before cutting.
6. Copy-sample fumigation-sample drying
There are two ways to copy. First, put the paper-cut samples on white paper and put them flat in the water together. When the water soaks the paper surface and contains no water drops, pull the engraved paper and white paper out of the water surface at the same time, stick them on the wood block, and then steam the paper on the oil lamp, but don't be too close to the lamp holder to avoid burns. If you need to make a lot of copies, you can take the method of printing pictures: stick the original and white paper coated with a layer of liquid medicine (red blood salt and aqueous solution), clamp it with two pieces of glass, expose it to the sun for 3- 14 hours, and then rinse the liquid medicine on the paper with clear water after development, and you can make copies.