What is seal cutting? What are the commonly used materials for seal cutting?

Seal cutting can be called printing and management printing, commonly known as seal cutting. It is a comprehensive traditional art with unique national style, which integrates calligraphy, art and sculpture, also known as "seal cutting".

Before the Qin dynasty, the monarch and the people called it "the seal". After Qin Shihuang unified the six countries, only the emperor could call it a "seal", and his deputies could only call it a "seal". Other official seals in the Han Dynasty were also called "seal" and "seal letter" besides "seal". In the Tang Dynasty, Wu Zetian thought that the pronunciation of "seal" was similar to that of "death" and changed it to "treasure". After the Tang and Song Dynasties, there were "Ji" and "Zhu Ji" in official seals and private seals. The characters of the seal are divided into Zhu Wen and Bai Wen. The strokes of white seal script are concave. If you stamp the paper with inkpad, the effect will be white characters on a red background, called "Bai Wen" and commonly known as "Yin Wen", while Zhu's seal script strokes are convex. If you stamp the paper with inkpad, the effect will be scarlet letters on a white background, called "Zhu Wen" and commonly known as "Yang Wen".

Sealing cutting material:

Ancient and modern printing materials include metal, ivory and jade ... At present, people who engage in seal cutting like stones.

1. Qingtian stone, produced in Qingtian, Zhejiang Province, is soft, brittle, delicate and moderate in hardness, suitable for cutting and seal cutting.

2. Shoushan stone, produced in Shoushan, Fujian, is slightly sticky, and the "thin yellow" stone is the most precious.

3. Chang fossil, produced in Changhua, Zhejiang, in which "bloodstone" is the most precious and "dry" in texture. Sese ",and contains sand nails.

Stone should be pure and transparent, smooth to the touch, with few sand nails (preferably no sand nails).

Seal cutting tool:

Use carving knife, inkpad, pen, paper, sandpaper, grindstone, mirror, brush and cloth.

1. Meat cleaver, there are several different models of meat cleavers, with different sizes, and they are usually double-edged.

2. Ink, thick but not rough, bright but not oily, fresh and light in color, the best for a long time.

3. Pen, Yin Gao should write small letters, such as purple brush, clothing line, crab claws and little red hair.

4. Paper, which has transparency and water absorption, can be designed for Yin Gao, such as copy paper, bamboo paper and edge paper. Printing paper can be thin and uniform Xuan paper, such as "Shi Lian" and "Lian Mian Xuan".

5. Sandpaper with a particle size of 80 mesh 1? About 1/2, thick and thin sandpaper. Used to smooth the printing surface.

6. Oilstone, not soaked in oil. Used to grind off carving knives or high-hardness seals.

7. Mirror, used to find the effect of "text" for Yin Gao on the printed surface, so as to correct the printed text.

8. Brush and cloth, used to clean gypsum and oil stains on the printing surface. You can also use a toothbrush.