The origin, prosperity, types and uses of the art of paper-cutting (to be brief)

Paper cutting, also known as paper carving, is one of the oldest folk arts of the Han Chinese people, and its history can be traced back to the 6th century AD. Window decoration or cut-outs. The difference is in the creation, some with scissors, some with a carving knife, although the tools are different, but the creation of works of art are basically the same, people collectively referred to as paper-cutting. Paper cutting is a kind of hollow art, which visually gives a person the feeling of transparency and artistic enjoyment. Its carrier can be paper, gold and silver foil, bark, leaves, cloth, leather, leather and other sheet materials.

The art of paper-cutting is a traditional folk craft of the Chinese nation, which has a long and enduring history, and is the treasure of Chinese folk art, which has become a kind of treasure in the world's art treasury. Those simple, vivid and interesting art modeling has a unique artistic charm. Its characteristics are mainly manifested in the two-dimensionality of the spatial concept, the knife flavor paper sense, lines and decorations, writing and allegory and many other aspects.

Paper-cutting originated from the ancient ancestor praying for God's activities, rooted in the profound Chinese traditional culture, two thousand years of development history, so that it condensed the traditional concepts of Chinese culture, in its evolution, and pottery art, rock art and other sister arts intertwined with each other, extending the ancient national humanistic spirit and ideological pulse. It has become an integral part of traditional Chinese culture, epitomizing traditional beliefs and human morals, and is also a window to observe the folklore and cultural heritage of a nation. The invention of Chinese paper-cutting was in the Western Han Dynasty (3rd century B.C.), when people used thin sheets of material to make crafts through the technique of openwork carving, which was popular as early as before the emergence of paper, i.e., carving, skeletonizing, picking, engraving, and scissoring techniques on gold foil, leather, silk, and even on leaves. The invention of paper in the Han Dynasty led to the emergence, development and popularization of paper-cutting. Paper is a very easy to moldy material, people will not be like treasures to save, spoiled their own can be cut again. Tang Dynasty paper-cutting has been in a period of great development, Du Fu's poem has "warm water wash my feet, cut paper to attract my soul" sentence, to cut paper to attract the soul of the custom has been spread to the folk at that time. Song Dynasty paper industry is mature, paper products, a variety of names, for the popularity of paper cutting provides the conditions. Ming and Qing dynasties paper-cutting handmade art to maturity, and reached its heyday. Folk

Paper-cutting handmade art of the use of a wider range, such as folk lanterns on the flower decorations, fan decorations, as well as embroidery patterns, etc., are not the use of paper-cutting as a decorative into the reprocessing. More often than not, China's folk paper cutting as decorative home ornaments, beautify the home environment, such as the door stacks, window flowers, cabinet flowers, flowers, flowers, roof flowers, etc. are used to decorate the doors and windows, room paper cutting.

1. Yang carving

The main line, the shape of the line to stay, the other part of the cut, and the line is connected to the line, but also to stay in the shape of the open outside of the cut, known as the positive shape.

2. Shady carving

Block-based, the shape of the line cut away, line line line break, and cut the shape of the empty, known as the negative shape.

3. Yin and Yang Carving

The combination of Yang Carving and Yin Carving.

Folk paper-cutting is good at combining many kinds of objects together and producing desirable and beautiful results. Whether with one or more image combination, are "to the image of meaning", "to the meaning of the image" to modeling, rather than according to the objective natural form to modeling, and at the same time, good at using the technique of the good luck to create a variety of than Xing, to the agreed-upon combination of images to express their psychology. Express their own psychology. The pursuit of auspicious metaphors becomes one of the ultimate purposes of the combination of imagery.

Types are:

Southern faction

represented by Hubei Shinyang paper-cutting, Guangdong Foshan paper-cutting and Fujian folk paper-cutting

Northern faction

Represented by Qingyang paper-cutting, Shanxi paper-cutting, Weixian paper-cutting, Shaanxi folk paper-cutting, magnetic paper-cutting and Shandong folk paper-cutting.