The Historical Background and Development Status of Guangxi Zhuang Brocade

Guangxi Zhuang Brocade, Yun Brocade, Shu Brocade and Song Brocade are also called the four famous brocades in China. It is said that it originated in the Song Dynasty and is a cultural treasure of the Chinese nation.

Zhuangjin Wen Zhuang is called mbaw laiz Fax, which means a page in heaven. This exquisite handicraft woven from cotton thread or silk thread has vivid patterns, rigorous structure and bright colors, and is full of warm and cheerful national style, which reflects the worship of the Zhuang people to heaven and earth and their pursuit and yearning for a better life.

Xincheng county is one of the origins of Guangxi Zhuang brocade, with a long history and profound cultural heritage. Xincheng Zhuang Brocade was once a fine product in Guangxi Zhuang Brocade, and it was presented to the court as a tribute.

Traditional Handmade Brocade of Zhuang Nationality in China. It is said that it originated in the Song Dynasty, with cotton thread and hemp thread as the ground warp and interwoven with plain weft, and was used to make dresses, towels, quilts, backpacks, tablecloths and so on. Mainly distributed in Jingxi, Xincheng, Binyang and other counties in Guangxi.

There are more than 20 kinds of traditional patterns, such as two dragons playing with pearls, palindromes, water patterns, moire patterns, flowers and animals, and more than 80 kinds of new patterns, such as "Guilin landscape" and "national unity", which are rich in national style.

Zhuang nationality has a long history. Zhuang nationality was called Li nationality, Liao nationality, Xian nationality and Tu nationality in ancient times. Since the Song Dynasty, it has been renamed as Gelao and Zhuang.

Zhuang nationality has a long history and has lived in Guangxi, Yunnan, Guizhou and parts of Hunan in the southwest of China for generations. Zhuang brocade, also known as "brocade" and "velvet quilt", is thick in texture. Zhuang Brocade is known as one of the four famous brocades in China, and it is a national cultural treasure in Guangxi.

Zhuang brocade is a work of art with cotton yarn as warp and various colored velvet as weft, which is skillfully interwoven on a hand loom equipped with a support system, a transmission device, a heddle dividing device and a jacquard device. Zhuang brocade, also known as "brocade" and "velvet quilt", is thick in texture.

Zhuang brocade is most suitable for quilt cover, bedspread, backpack, hanging bag, apron and tablecloth. Zhuang brocade takes cotton or hemp as warp and weaves with untwisted or slightly twisted colored weft yarns, forming symmetrical patterns on the front and back of the fabric, completely covering the ground structure, increasing the thickness, and picking them out with various colored weft yarns. The pattern structure is complex, with geometric patterns, bright colors and strong contrast, and it has a strong and rough artistic style.

The Historical Background of Guangxi Zhuang Brocade

Zhuang Brocade is one of the most representative national handicrafts in Guangxi Zhuang area, and it is also one of the four famous brocades in China. Location: Jingxi, Xincheng and Binyang counties in Guangxi. The staff of the Tusi Museum in Xincheng County told us that according to legend, a Zhuang girl named Danimei carefully weaved it-from then on, a magnificent brocade was produced.

Archaeology confirmed that as early as the Han Dynasty, Guangxi had brocade skills. According to Six Songs of the Tang Dynasty and Records of Yuanhe County, all kinds of fabrics woven by Zhuang people at that time have been listed as tributes by feudal dynasties. But the textiles that can really be called "brocade" appeared in the Song Dynasty. In the Song Dynasty, the cloth with "thick white stripes" was the early brocade.

As a kind of arts and crafts, Zhuang brocade is one of the most wonderful cultural creations of the Zhuang people, and its history is also very long. It is said that as early as the Han dynasty, a kind of "acupoint cloth" was produced in the local area, in which "the thin man keeps out the heat and the soft man keeps out the cold". Smart Zhuang people make full use of plant fibers to weave kudzu vine and twine cloth as clothing. According to the records quoted in Guangdong New Talk at that time, this kind of cloth was "thin and suitable for summer heat, soft and familiar but cold-proof". After the founding of New China, archaeologists excavated several orange tapestries in the No.7 remnant burial pit of the Han Tomb in Luobowan, Guangxi, which proved that Guangxi had tapestry skills in the Han Dynasty.

In the Tang Dynasty, according to Six Songs of the Tang Dynasty and Yuanhe County Records, nine kinds of fabrics woven by the Zhuang nationality at that time, such as banana cloth, bamboo cloth, Ji cloth, ban cloth, Du Luobu, linen cloth, silk cloth and food list, had been listed as tributes by the feudal dynasty.

The Song of Rice White written by Zhang Ji in the Tang Dynasty praised the white bamboo cloth and said, "Bright white bamboo is white and fresh, and teenagers are called spring clothes." People look much younger in clothes made of white bamboo cloth.

Zhuang brocade has experienced the development and changes from monochrome to colorful and from simple to complex. The fragments of black-orange-red Hui Wen Brocade unearthed from the Han Tomb in Radish Bay in Guigang can be regarded as the origin of Zhuang Brocade.

In the Tang Dynasty, the Zhuang people's plantain cloth, bamboo cloth, sanshui cloth, spotted cloth and silk all became court tributes. But the textiles that can really be called "brocade" appeared in the Song Dynasty.

In the Song Dynasty, the cloth with "thick white stripes" was the early brocade. During the Yuanfeng period of the Northern Song Dynasty, Lu Dafang founded Shujin Academy in Sichuan. Among the four tapestries, Guangxi Brocade (Zhuang Brocade) is one of the tributes, which shows the preciousness of Zhuang Brocade.

According to Fan Chengda's Gui Zhi in the Southern Song Dynasty, Zhuang brocade was produced in the left and right rivers of Guangxi at that time, which was called "carbonyl cloth". At that time, the "light cloth" produced by "Liangjiangzhou Cave" was like "China Line, with small Fang Shengwen everywhere".

Zhou Qufei said in A Generation Beyond the Ridge: Flannel is "white and square, wide and big, like the line between China and the United States, while beauty is heavy and sincere, and it is also above the south". The so-called "white square pattern" refers to the Zhuang brocade produced at that time. Its decorative pattern is a checkered geometric pattern, and its tone is monochrome. This is an early brocade with the basic characteristics of "massiness" and plaid pattern.

In Song Dynasty, the handicraft textile industry of Zhuang nationality was more developed. At that time, the Song Dynasty needed "silk, silk, cloth and silk brocade for military supplies" and established "Shujin Academy" in Sichuan. A large number of Shu brocade was transported to Guangxi and then exported from Guangxi.

The Zhuang people quickly accepted the craft of Shu Brocade, and the famous Zhuang Brocade came into being. (Excerpted from Huang Xianfan's General History of Zhuang Nationality). At that time, it was produced in all counties. "Strong people love to choose clothes, skirts, towels and quilts, and all of them are woven with five-color wool, just like flowers and birds." "Marry an urn, brocade quilt cover is absolutely indispensable, so that hometown people can knit. The local brocade is made of willow velvet and made into five colors. Thick and durable, worth five taels. My unmarried daughter will learn to knit a sweater. "

Zhuang brocade is not only an article and ornament in the daily life of Zhuang people, but also an indispensable "female red" for Zhuang women. Zhuang brocade is an indispensable thing in dowry. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, Zhuang brocade began to decline.

Development Status of Zhuang Brocade in Guangxi

Before the early 1990s, the development of Zhuang brocade industry in all parts of Guangxi had been on the rise, which promoted the rapid development of Guangxi's economy. However, in recent years, the inheritance and development of Guangxi Zhuang Brocade has encountered bottlenecks in the process of modernization, mainly in the following three aspects:

(1) Inheriting the fault crisis.

With the deepening of social change and the introduction of high-end technology, Zhuang culture is being influenced by other ethnic groups and even foreign cultures. In addition, some outstanding Zhuang brocade inheritors are getting older, and other Zhuang brocade artists have begun to shift from this traditional low-income field to other development fields, resulting in a serious phenomenon that the inheritance of Zhuang brocade skills is broken and the development prospects of Zhuang brocade crafts are bleak.

(B) the lack of innovation in the production process

Due to the lack of sensitivity of traditional handicraft skills to modern innovative elements, the market of Zhuang brocade products is gradually replaced by mechanized products, which makes the traditional works of Zhuang brocade out of touch with the contemporary aesthetic needs, and the designed products have no big breakthrough in theme, pattern, pattern and style. , resulting in fewer types of Zhuang brocade crafts, low awareness and weak branding.

(C) a single product promotion channel

In the modern society with highly developed new media, the promotion channels of Zhuang brocade products are too single, which leads to the continuous loss of Zhuang brocade's unique humanistic atmosphere and cultural connotation. In the process of conveying cultural ideas and symbols, there are practical problems such as poor visual communication effect, low brand effect, weak market competitiveness and shrinking product consumption.