Social Significance of Foshan Woodblock New Year Pictures

Foshan has a profound historical and cultural heritage. In the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the well-known folk crafts in Lingnan, such as paper-cutting, New Year pictures, golden flowers, light colors, binding, wood carving, brick carving, stone carving and gray plastic carving, are inextricably linked with local folk customs, reflecting the folk customs and folk mentality of Guangfu everywhere, which is comprehensive and profound, and the paintings in recent years are representative.

As a folk art, New Year pictures are the product of folk customs. Its formation and development are closely related to many folk activities. Influenced by folk culture, Foshan New Year pictures, whether based on folklore, worship of gods, romantic stories or real life, are closely related to folk culture, which embodies the unique folk connotation and aesthetic consciousness and vividly shows the customs and humanistic spirit of Lingnan people. Foshan has lasted for hundreds of years, and the colorful folk customs have enriched the theme of Foshan New Year pictures, which is a veritable combination of folk customs and folk art. With the spread of New Year pictures, folk activities have not only won the love of the people, but also produced a wide range of social influences. People can feel mellow folk customs and unique folk customs from some New Year pictures.

Kite, called "paper kite" in ancient times, is an early folk entertainment product in China, and flying kites is a common folk entertainment activity. In ancient Foshan, there was also a special folk organization "Flying Harrier". The New Year picture "Flying Paper Kites" depicts a group of innocent and lively children playing flying paper kites in spring and Qingming.

Foshan is a famous hometown of martial arts. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, there were many schools of martial arts, and the people had a long tradition of martial arts. Many artists of New Year pictures are also martial arts lovers. It is not uncommon for them to create New Year pictures with martial arts as the theme, which is a major feature of local folk art in Foshan. The New Year picture "Tournament Map" depicts a pair of childlike teenagers fighting with sticks and halberds. The competition between the two sides is fierce and it is difficult to tell the winner. This New Year picture reflects the prevailing martial arts atmosphere at that time. . Traditional folk New Year pictures can best reflect the inner feelings of China people and the unique cultural psychology of the Chinese nation. In this respect, Foshan New Year pictures are also fully reflected, which is an image reflection of folk customs.

Faith in God

Cantonese people have been common ghosts since ancient times, and the deep-rooted pantheism belief makes the demand for idol paintings very large, with as many as100000 pieces sold every year, accounting for a large proportion in Foshan New Year pictures. Most of the idol paintings are taken from Buddhist gods and folk gods: there are water gods, such as Bei Di, Tian Hou, Long Mu and Hong Sheng; The god of wealth has mysterious shrines and wealth stars; Zhong Kui, Guan Gong, Bao Gong, Kou, Wei Zi and Qitian Sheng Da are the evil spirits. Fu Na has Tai Shang Lao Jun, Guanyin, Bin Gong Buddha, Sakyamuni, Eight Immortals and He Erxian. The industry gods include Aunt Silkworm and Guan Gong. Almost all the Buddhist and Taoist immortals in China are included, which is a major feature of Foshan New Year Pictures. With the evolution of history, the deity painting has gradually developed from the initial protective function of exorcising evil spirits and avoiding disasters to a protector with multiple functions, such as receiving and welcoming blessings. To a great extent, it combines the wishes and longings of the general public for future life, and also reflects the compatibility between ancient Lingnan folk beliefs and customs and Guangfu culture.

Pay attention to children

Paying attention to children is the product of China's family concept. Auspicious patterns such as "a hundred flowers blossom", "a lotus gives birth to a noble child", "red berries bear many children" and "melons and fruits" symbolize the image of prosperous people and offspring. They are the eternal theme of folk art and the main decorative patterns of Foshan New Year pictures, which directly reflect people's worship of life. Nurses' pictures, monkey king in town, tiger in town house and other New Year pictures to protect children from diseases and disasters and grow up healthily are widely welcomed by the people. This kind of New Year pictures shows people's ideal pursuit of children and family prosperity. This cultural psychology centered on blood system not only affects people's cultural life customs, but also reflects the creative concept of folk New Year pictures.

Pray for good luck.

Folk New Year pictures have the saying that "the picture must be intentional" and "the meaning must be auspicious". It is a positive outlook on life of the Chinese nation to rely on folk artworks to pin good hopes for future life. Under the slavery and exploitation of the ruling class in feudal society, the people were trapped in a closed cultural circle for many years and lived a miserable and poor life. Even though their life is extremely difficult, even hungry and naked, they are always full of confidence and hope for life. In Foshan New Year pictures, such as "Phoenix Peony", "Like Dragon and Phoenix", "Fulu Shouquan" and "Harvest of Five Grains", a large number of New Year pictures contain auspicious themes, which decorate people's living environment with their food, clothing, housing and transportation. From generation to generation, it lasts forever. In a sense, it is also a potential driving force for the prosperity of the Chinese nation.

moral education

China is a country of etiquette, and the Chinese nation advocates ethics. Many themes of Foshan New Year pictures contain traditional moral concepts such as educating people to be good and abstain from evil, respecting the old and loving the young, being loyal to filial piety and saving righteousness, and family harmony. For example, the "harmonious double saints" depicted in the pictures such as "Harmonious Teenager" and "Harmonious Making Money" are the goddess of love in folklore and the symbol of deep affection and righteousness. This kind of New Year pictures has rich meanings of "harmony" and "family harmony", and contains the basic thoughts of China's ethics.

The New Year picture of "God-given Gold" depicts the wealth given by the God of Wealth to the world. The picture book has a line "The wealth of heaven and earth will eventually be good", which embodies the traditional concept of China people that "a gentleman loves money and takes it wisely". Folk New Year pictures are related to the fine traditional purpose of ancient paintings, that is, "to be clear and try to rise and sink". The publicity and education of New Year pictures has played an important role in observing social morality, strengthening moral cultivation, improving social atmosphere and carrying forward Chinese traditional virtues. Folk activities are inseparable from folk art, and many folk activities add color atmosphere because of folk art. In the long years, Foshan New Year pictures have survived and developed with the daily life and folk activities of working people. The reason why folk art can spread among the people for a long time depends entirely on the people's continuous re-creation in combination with folk activities and daily needs. It carries the good wishes and hopes of the working people and is passed down from generation to generation in the long river of history.

During the Spring Festival, door gods, New Year pictures and people's beautiful expectations for the coming year entered thousands of households. Folk New Year pictures are festive in content, auspicious in shape and rich in color, which makes the folk activities of the New Year full of happy and peaceful atmosphere. The fifteenth day of the first month, Lantern Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival are traditional festivals in Foshan history, and every household has the custom of buying lanterns and hanging them. It is decorated with a lamp painting printed by the door god. It adds a festive atmosphere to traditional folk festivals.

In daily life, many folk activities, such as ten-year-old festivals, fairs, ancestors' birthdays, moving, promotion and appointment, paying teachers to thank God, playing in the Dojo, giving birth to a moon, etc., are decorated with New Year pictures, adding gorgeous colors to colorful folk activities. Foshan New Year pictures are not famous for their exquisite craftsmanship, gorgeous decoration and even elegance, but they look a bit "tacky" and have a mellow and simple local flavor, which is a characteristic of local folk culture and a distinctive feature of folk culture. Folk arts and crafts are the materialization of the creative consciousness of folk artists. Because the starting point and concept of creation are the same, it really retains the vitality of Lingnan folk culture passed down from ancestors. Through these folk art works, people can learn about the profound China culture and colorful local folk customs.

New Year pictures are not only colorful embellishments of festivals and folk activities, but also carriers of cultural circulation, moral education, aesthetic exchange and belief inheritance. These characteristics are incomparable to other paintings, which means that New Year pictures not only have artistic value, but also have the value of video materials for studying history, politics, customs, people's life mentality and ideological pursuit. They are the frame of reference for understanding people's thinking patterns and cultural psychology in the past, so they have always been valued by researchers and are important resources for studying Guangfu folk customs.

First of all, Foshan New Year pictures reflect the life history of the bottom people, which truly records the folk customs at that time, is full of the wisdom of working people and carries rich historical and cultural information. Its theme, content, work form and materials all change with the development of social economy, with the times and customs, and with the feelings and imagination of the people. Some folk activities and events have disappeared or lost with the development of history. For example, the legend of the Southern Lion originated in Foshan, and lion dancing has a long history. Because it belongs to a kind of folk entertainment, practicing martial arts and strengthening the body, the historical records are almost blank, leaving no video materials. The shape, color, percussion, action form and activity scene of the Southern Lion can't be verified. In New Year pictures, images depicting lion awakening provide valuable information for people, and provide examples for textual research and research on Foshan's famous folk binding craft "Lion Head", lion awakening activities and the development of martial arts culture. Another example is the large number of statues in Foshan New Year Pictures, which not only have a wide variety, but also have amazing sales. Their emergence and development are closely related to eclecticism and polytheism in ancient Lingnan folk beliefs, and they are precious materials for exploring the historical development track of Lingnan folk beliefs. Some New Year pictures also reflect the social changes, fashions and social customs consciously or unconsciously expressed by people in economic activities such as building construction, furniture arrangement, production equipment, transportation, people's costumes, etc., leaving a lot of valuable video materials for local folklore research. Guangdong is the birthplace of Lingnan culture, and Foshan is an important part of Lingnan culture and one of the centers of Guangfu culture. Foshan New Year pictures reflect the traditional Guangfu cultural consciousness.

Secondly, the study of folk New Year pictures and folklore in China started late, and the social customs of civil society were relatively rare in the past official history. The New Year pictures are a mirror of secular folklore in different historical periods, which is undoubtedly an important image material for folklore research without video or audio recording in the past. It provides important reference value for people to study sociology, economics, folklore, aesthetics and archaeology in Guangfu area. These tangible materials can supplement the deficiency of folk history and provide sufficient reference for the study of humanities and social sciences.