The History and Characteristics of Chaoshan Paper-cutting

Chaoyang paper-cut is mainly distributed in Chaoshan area, Guangdong Province, represented by Union, Xiqiao, Heping and Guiyu Town in Chaoyang District. The rise of Chaoyang paper-cutting is related to the Central Plains people who moved here. This paper-cut style mostly shows auspicious themes, such as auspicious celebration, Fulu's birthday, Five Blessingg's prosperity, descendants' continuation, bumper harvests and six animals' prosperity. It is usually used as decoration in god competitions, Lantern Festival lights-off, Mid-Autumn Festival Yue Bai, the celebration of wedding customs and ancestor worship, etc. It also shows some daily life contents, such as flowers, birds, insects, fish, animals, folklore, fairy tales and opera figures. In addition to the above varieties, Chaoyang paper-cut also has some small decorative patterns, such as flowers, flowers and so on. Chaoyang paper-cut is flexible in shape, symmetrical in composition, rigorous in structure, full and not messy, especially the layout of "flowers in flowers" is the most distinctive, dense and exquisite. Paper-cutting knife is exquisite and delicate, mainly male scissors, combined with female scissors. The lines of male scissors are neat and meticulous, and the lines of female scissors are strong and powerful. Coupled with the technique of "arranging flowers in flowers", the expressive force is very rich.

Since 1980s, Chaoyang District Government has organized forces to excavate, arrange, protect and study Chaoyang folk paper-cuts. 1989 18 1 piece sorted out nearly 500 patterns and published the book Chaoyang Folk Paper-cutting. In 2003, more than 50 Chaoyang paper-cut works were included in The Complete Works of China Folk Art? Paper-cut volumes, China Folk Auspicious Art Fair, Complete Works of Chaoshan Folk Art? Paper-cut scrolls and other books. 65438-0997 Chaoyang District was named as "the hometown of folk art (paper-cut art) in Guangdong Province" by the Guangdong provincial government. At present, the main inheritors of Chaoyang folk paper-cutting are Zhang Peilong, Cai Mingying and Li Chanxian. However, the average age of living artists is over 75 years old, and young people are urgently needed to join the inheritance.

Chaozhou paper-cut is mainly distributed in eastern Guangdong, popular in Ming Dynasty, prosperous in Qing Dynasty and reaching its peak in Guangxu period. The existing work Bat (Simapu Town, Chaozhou City) during the Yongzheng period of the Qing Dynasty is cut with brown silk thread, which shows that Chaozhou paper-cutting has already reached a high artistic level.

In the middle of Qing dynasty, Chaozhou temple building became a common practice. In this context, paper-cutting is used as an ornament in folk activities such as sacrifices, festivals, wandering competitions, weddings and funerals, and monks and nuns in temples also present paper-cutting flowers to kind men and women, so Chaozhou paper-cutting has developed rapidly in temples. By the beginning of the 20th century, Chaoshan paper-cut artists brought out by nuns, such as Jiang Genhe, Li, Yang Xueyou, Luo Ruiyu, Gu Qiuquan and Xie Chuzhou, had played a role in local paper-cut creation. After 1962, Chaozhou paper-cut was gradually lost because there were no monks and nuns in the temple and monks and nuns became monks.

Chaozhou paper-cut theme involves flowers and fruits, animals, figures, landscapes and text patterns, with strong local cultural characteristics. Different paper-cut artists often have different styles such as meticulous, bold and elegant. According to the form, Chaozhou paper-cutting has three types: solid color, multicolor, positive engraving and negative engraving. Chaozhou folk paper-cutting artists are good at stacking three or five colored papers together, skillfully using scissors and cutting out various patterns with skillful skills. For example, solid color paper-cutting gives full play to the characteristics of "scissors", and creates a vivid artistic image with slender and beautiful lines and exaggerated deformation. Scissors are rich in flavor and decorative. Solid color paper-cutting has a characteristic, that is, it does not draw a draft. The artist just takes the paper in one hand and cuts it in the other, relying on memory and imagination to cut out the pattern directly. This ingenious cutting method is very creative, lively and changeable, and there are few repeated works. Multi-color paper-cutting is to cut out various parts of the object with multi-color paper, and then combine them into a complete paper-cutting work, which is vivid, meticulous and distinctive.

Chaozhou paper-cut has a variety called "chiseling paper", which is made by putting patterns on colored paper or gold foil and chiseling with a carving knife. "Chi paper" is divided into color paper-cut and writing paper-cut. Color line paper-cutting uses gold foil or black paper to carve the outline first, and then uses color paper as the base material; Writing paper-cut uses solid color paper or gold foil to describe the image of line skeleton, and then uses color to paint on the substrate. The colored paper in Loujin Village, Raoping County is most famous for its papermaking technology. Colored paper, commonly known as "big bills", is used to worship gods, ancestors or walk around gods. Its contents are mainly opera figures, birds, animals, insects, fish, flowers, Bo Gu, poetry and calligraphy.