In the poverty alleviation workshop of Huawu Village, an embroidery lady displays Miao embroidery products on live broadcast.
Peng Yi, a non-hereditary heir of Hmong batik, is making batik lamps.
Xinren Miao Nationality Township Huawu Village in Qianxi City, Guizhou Province, is located in the Wujiangyuan Baili Gallery.
Peng Yi's "Double Dragon Splashing" batik embroidery work.
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Culture
Purchased a computer embroidery machine, the mountain "haute couture" went out
A hand-embroidered garment, with white, red and green three main colors, and blue, purple as auxiliary colors embroidered to produce a unique national style pattern, fine workmanship, complex craftsmanship, known as hidden in the mountains "haute couture".
Needles as pens, threads as ink, and cloth as paper. Recording and writing one's own history in the form of embroidery is precisely the cultural expression of Xinren Miao Nationality Township Huawu Village in Qianxi City, Guizhou Province, which has been passed down from generation to generation.
But these "haute couture" hidden in the mountains are now facing the dilemma of not being able to get out of the mountains.
Due to the long production cycle, high pricing and narrow sales channels of pure hand embroidery, the situation of the development of the Miao embroidery industry is difficult to open. How to transform traditional crafts into mature industries? This is an urgent problem that needs to be solved on the road of rural revitalization.
General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed to support ethnic minorities and ethnic minority areas to develop characteristic advantageous industries and prosper and develop ethnic minority cultures.
Villager You Huazhong once worked in a computer printing factory in Wenzhou and stayed in Huawu Village after returning home. As a young man in the village who dares to think and dare to do it, he wants to try to take the road of returning to his hometown to start a business.
"A few years ago, when I was working in Wenzhou, Zhejiang, I saw the locals using computer embroidery machines, and it just so happened that there was a set of machines in the factory to retire, so I spent more than 20,000 yuan to buy one. Trying to use the embroidery mechanism to make a set of Miao costumes, it was found that the dressing time was shortened from more than half a year to a few days, and the work efficiency was rapidly improved. ”
In 2018, Huawu Village set up an embroidery industry, and the government funded the construction of factories for villagers. The establishment of the poverty alleviation workshop has opened the factory at the doorstep of the villagers, creating a nearby employment channel where "the workshop is at the doorstep of the home, and the only need to go to work is the next building".
In 2019, You Huazhong decided to co-found a batik embroidery company with his wife. They bought a computer embroidery machine from a bank loan, and then tried to live broadcast the promotion of house miao embroidery on the Internet, talking about this "computer embroidery machine", You Huazhong showed a smile: "Now, we have 5 new embroidery machines in this workshop, and it is more convenient for embroidery ladies to do crafts!"
Soliciting business and cultivating machine embroidery ladies, You Huazhong's Miao embroidery business has gradually improved.
"In the past, I used to work in Zhejiang, running around, the elderly and children couldn't take care of it, and now our family is in the workshop." Yang Dajie, a villager in her early forties, is taking her little granddaughter to work in You Huazhong's Miao embroidery workshop, and Yang Dajie is mainly responsible for the production of batik products. From the key bag used daily to the elegant and capable blue-dyed scarf, these are all the objects handled by Sister Yang. "A monthly salary gives me more than 3,000 yuan, now at home (life) is OK, just came back, worried about the age is afraid of poverty alleviation workshop do not want me to do (work). (Later) they said 'we need as long as you can do it'. That Miao traditional embroidery batik, I can do anything, workshop batik patternS I can design it, and then I stayed at work and didn't want to go out. ”
Cultural revitalization and industrial revitalization are inseparable. Professor Wu Fengyu of Central China Normal University believes in the article "Rural Cultural Revitalization from the Perspective of Cultural Governance: Value Coupling and System Construction" that the use of market-oriented mechanisms to transform rural cultural resources into cultural industries can not only enrich the supply of cultural products and better meet people's needs for a better cultural life, but also carry out developmental inheritance of rural traditional cultural heritage and protect and develop excellent rural traditional culture. Therefore, the development of rural cultural industries has multiple economic and social values.
Miaozhai embroidery is just a typical rural cultural model, the effective construction of the modern industrial chain, so that the millennium Miao embroidery "advanced customization", to achieve the possibility of going from the mountains to the world, but also let the poor embroidery ladies in the village, have a sense of happiness in employment at the doorstep.
To achieve employment at the doorstep of the family, Miaozhai embroidery women became rich
The miao embroidery attempt, which began with a computer embroidery machine, has now brought productivity improvements to the poverty alleviation workshop in Huawu Village, and has also brought more benefits.
In 2020, the output value of the Miao embroidery poverty alleviation workshop in Huawu Village reached more than 1 million yuan. "32 Miao embroiderers work in the workshop, achieving employment at the doorstep of their homes while taking care of their families." You Huazhong said that more than half of the 32 embroidery girls were once poor households in Lika, and all of them have now been lifted out of poverty.
Cultural innovation
Go to Graduate School in Guizhou and combine traditional batik with modern fashion
"Every generation of embroiderers is looking for new meanings. The inheritance of national handicrafts is a burden on my shoulders. ”
Peng Yi, 37, is the only non-hereditary inheritor of Hmong batik in Huawu Village. This young inheritor wants to inject some new possibilities into traditional Hmong batik embroidery.
In the eyes of the older generation of Huawu villagers, Miao embroidery is undoubtedly a craft that every household must master, and now under the tide of industrialization and urbanization, traditional handicrafts have gradually faded out of sight, and the audience of rural cultural products is gradually decreasing. How to make Miao embroidery come alive? This is a topic that Peng Yi and countless non-hereditary inheritors need to think about.
"Because of the constant emphasis on the leading role of modernization and urbanization in the field of economic development, people have a plausible and vague conception: only cities represent the direction of progress of advanced, civilized or historical progress." In the view of Liu Chen, a professor at the Central Party School, under the guidance of this concept, some people regard the countryside as a representative of backwardness, closure and ignorance, which is not enough to support the development of modernization, and should be gradually transformed or even eliminated in the process of urbanization.
In his daily work, Peng Yi also found that Miao batik and embroidery are only used in daily necessities such as headdresses and clothes, and the scope is too narrow. "And in the past, when we did Miao embroidery and batik, we would only imitate our ancestors, what pattern they painted, we would paint what pattern, what they embroidered, we embroidered, without a sense of innovation, we would not add or subtract."
So she decided to go to Guizhou University for Nationalities to study, hoping to combine traditional batik with modern fashion.
"Three years of graduate school have broadened my innovative thinking and improved my skills, allowing me to find a way to combine tradition and modernity." After graduating with a master's degree, Peng Yi decided to return to Huawu Village to start a business, founded the "Primary Color dyeing" intangible cultural heritage training center, served as a designer of cultural and creative products in the poverty alleviation workshop, and led the "mothers" in the village to jointly produce Miao embroidery and batik products with a sense of fashion.
Cultural and creative lamps, tableware and ethnic costumes with both beautiful and practical appearances have embarked on the assembly line of poverty alleviation workshop production one by one, which not only broadens the product line, but also allows "Huawu Cultural Creation" to have new sales channels on the Internet.
Peng Yi has also become the "wisdom bearer" in the poverty alleviation workshop of the chemical house. In her mobile phone notes, there are pattern materials she downloaded, and there are also trivial inspirations in life, and the grass and trees and patterns in Miaozhai are the same objects of her thinking. In order to maintain a creative mind, she often goes to Jingdezhen and other ethnic cultural heritage sites to learn local cultural and creative design concepts, and constantly collides with creative sparks.
"If you want to 'live' intangible cultural heritage, you need to do a good job of 'addition and subtraction'"
Years of deep cultivation in the industry, coupled with professional academic thinking, made Peng Yi realize a truth: "If you want to 'live' the intangible cultural heritage, you need to do a good job of 'addition and subtraction'".
She believes that the so-called "addition and subtraction" is still based on the tradition of national handicrafts. From the perspective of disassembly, to do addition, it is necessary to integrate cross-border design, use the concept of "mix-and-match" to combine elements such as wood art and ceramics with traditional skills such as embroidery and batik, and produce products that can be used in daily life. Subtraction can be combined with product functions, simplify the use of patterns and colors, highlight an element, and ensure that the use function of the item and the aesthetic function achieve a unified balance. "Make the color combination look more elegant, more in line with modern aesthetics, and not outdated."
With this concept, Peng Yi and the "Miao embroidery attempts" of huawu villagers went farther and farther. Batik-inlaid wooden chairs, teacups and teapots with embroidered interlining, batik dolls in fresh colors, fabric fashion with both ethnic and fashionable touches... The studio even has home light fixtures that combine batik and embroidery.
Building a rural cultural industry cannot take the route of homogenization and replication, and Peng Yi's desire to "inject new blood" into huawu cultural creation has become a reality.
Not long ago, the batik ragdoll designed by Peng Yi found a sales channel in a designer APP, the zodiac doll sold hot, and the guangzhou manufacturer placed 150,000 orders for Peng Yi. Customers left a message on the APP saying that they did not expect that batik could also make such a "cute" object.
Today, Peng Yi is still leading more than 50 embroidery girls in Huawu Village and Qianxi City to produce and develop new products. "Only by constantly developing and promoting new ones, refining the national patterns to the market, and having good businesses can we have better help for inheritance." Peng Yi said.
"Traditional craftsmanship can also be fashionable." Peng Yi and the Miao embroidery of the villagers of Huawu have nostalgia that can be retained, and they have a visible future.
A06-09 edition
Chief planner: Rong Mingchang
Executive planner: Wang Weiguo Wang Jia
Coordinator: Chen Weibin, Chen Shi, Zhu Huidong, Guan Jianming
Executive Coordinator: Chen Guoli Hu Qunfang
Editorial Coordinator: Thoughtful
Video Co-ordinator: Dangerous Art
Creative Coordinator: Zhang Bo
Chief Writer: Dong Xiaoyan
Written by: Nandu reporter Zhou Quan Shi Minglei Li Simeng Cai Silan Dong Shuyun Xu Chengxu Huang Wei Ye Xiaowen Liu Baoyang
Photo/Video: Nandu reporter Wei Yi, Zhang Jing, Liu Wei, Wu Jialin, Lin Yaohua, Li Lin, Chen Canrong, Li Menglin, Huang Yiting, Zhang Chi, Xu Jie