Source: Friends of Science 202112 inheritance
Text: Xie Ying
Throughout the long history of Chinese civilization, there are always a few things, no matter in what era and place, can always shine, such as silk, such as tea, or porcelain.
Porcelain, which at first was an instrument that could only be used by princes and nobles, gradually became one of the main products exported by China. Today, porcelain has entered thousands of households and has become an indispensable part of our lives.
Among the various types of ceramics, there is a unique porcelain species with superior grade and profound craftsmanship, which is the stranded porcelain that began in China's Tang Dynasty and is known as the "gentleman in porcelain".
A Song Dynasty hanging tire porcelain bowl in the Collection of the Palace Museum
Originating from the Tang Dynasty and flourishing in the Song Dynasty, stranded porcelain has been passed down from generation to generation in Jiaozuo City, Henan Province for more than a thousand years, mainly from the Dangyang Yu kiln group area. Stranded tire porcelain, also known as "flower-through porcelain", is made of two or more different colors of porcelain clay using a unique grinding tire manual technique to combine the tire molding, roasting, known as "woven porcelain". The porcelain pattern is born from the fetus, the inside and outside are connected, the inside and outside are transparent, one side of the child, can not be copied, because of its consistent characteristics in the appearance is known as "the gentleman in porcelain".
In 2014, the "Dangyangyu Stranded Tire Porcelain Firing Technique" was announced by the State Council as a representative project of national intangible cultural heritage.
The Song Dynasty stranded porcelain pot in the Jiaozuo Museum
Every city has an irreplaceable and exclusive logo, just as stranded porcelain is to Jiaozuo.
Xiuwu County, Jiaozuo City, known as "Ningyi" in ancient times, is the hometown of Ning Fengzi, the first pottery maker and inventor of pottery in China. Ning Fengzi is regarded as the originator of China's ceramic industry because of his creation and invention of pottery firing.
National intangible cultural heritage project Dangyangyu hanging tire porcelain firing technology inheritor: Chai Zhanzhu
The Dangyangyu kiln is a large-scale kiln with the most variations in style, the most abundant variety of shapes and decorations, and the extremely fine workmanship among the porcelain kilns of the Song Dynasty, and is a treasure of folk art. Stranded tire porcelain is made of two or more different colors of porcelain clay, forming a pattern of different colors, with the same appearance and endless changes in the artistic characteristics.
Cheng Yun, a local official in charge of burning porcelain in Jingdezhen in the Northern Song Dynasty, once wrote "Song of Dangyang Porcelain Kiln", which greatly praised The Dangyangyu hanging tire porcelain: "Dangyang copper medicine is really strange, and the skillful pottery Is particularly exquisite... The embryo is in the red furnace and can be cooked in three days. The brilliance of the opening is amazing, and the copper color is as white as jade..." From this, we can see that at that time, the craftsmanship of The Yangyu stranded porcelain was exquisite and the works were exquisite.
Ceramic archaeologists Feng Xianming and Ye Zhemin raised their evaluation of the hanging porcelain process to a new height when they were investigating the Dangyangyu kiln: "When Yangyu stranded porcelain is exquisite, it is a must in China. ”
Chai Zhanzhu's work "Fruit"
Chai Zhanzhu's work "Peacock Kettle"
Stranded tire porcelain is the first porcelain species to be born in the process of transition from pottery to porcelain in the world, and it is a ceramic with the greatest difficulty, highest cost and lowest success rate in the ceramic family. It involves mud formula, glaze formula, hand-knitting, modeling design, temperature curve firing and other aspects, each link needs to go through repeated tests, hundreds of failure lessons and exploration, in order to master the key technical points.
Chai Zhanzhu inspects the carcass to be fired
The landscape is not picturesque, and the kiln fire is silent for more than a thousand years.
With his love for the art of stranded porcelain and perseverance, Chai Zhanzhu has gone through a bumpy artistic journey.
In March 1985, Chai Zhanzhu began to learn the technique of firing stranded porcelain.
In 1987, he went to the Ceramic Research Institute in Jingdezhen, the capital of porcelain, as a porcelain stylist to study porcelain design and production.
In 2000, Chai Zhanzhu founded Jiaozuo Jinguxuan Stranded Tire Porcelain Art Co., Ltd., which integrates the creation, research and development, production and sales of stranded tire porcelain, and has a production base - Xiuwu County Dangyangyu Stranded Tire Art Porcelain Factory.
On April 28, 2002, the first kiln of stranded tire porcelain fired by Chai Zhanzhu was successfully released from the kiln, and CCTV broadcast the news that "stranded tire porcelain was reborn in Jiaozuo after nearly a thousand years of loss", which made the national ceramic community excited and cheered.
In 2018, Jinguxuan Stranded Tire Porcelain Art Co., Ltd. was awarded the "Certification Trademark" by the State Intellectual Property Office for having 125 national patents.
In addition, Chai Zhanzhu also drafted and compiled the local standards for Dangyangyu stranded tire porcelain in Henan Province, and successively assisted in the declaration of many honorary titles such as "National Intangible Cultural Heritage Project", "National Geographical Indication Protection Product", "China's Stranded Tire Porcelain Capital", so that the city can leave memories and retain nostalgia for people.
Stranded purple sand god lamppot
Chai Zhanzhu believes that art that leaves tradition is a rootless wood, and art without innovation is the water that is not flowing. Works of art need to be innovative in order to have vitality.
On the basis of inheriting the traditional craftsmanship of stranded tire porcelain and retaining its artistic characteristics, combined with the aesthetic orientation of modern people, Chai Zhanzhu boldly introduces the experience and techniques of other art disciplines, and innovates in terms of modeling, glaze color, firing process, etc., so that stranded tire porcelain has a stronger artistic expression.
In particular, there has been a breakthrough in ornamentation. Natural patterns, such as flowing clouds and flowing water, desert smoke, etc., are very rich in the charm of Chinese paintings; regular patterns, such as feathers, straw weaving, flowers, ears of wheat, peacock screens, etc., are mysterious and elegant. More than 40 of his works have been collected in more than 30 museums at home and abroad, and his work "Porcelain Rhyme" won the gold medal of the China Intangible Cultural Heritage Exposition.
Chai Zhanzhu is carving the work "Fruitful"
Appreciation of Chai Zhanzhu's stranded porcelain works
Heirs Archives
Chai Zhanzhu, male, born in 1964 in Jiaozuo City, Henan Province, is a senior arts and crafts artist, a representative inheritor of the national intangible cultural heritage representative project (Dangyangyu stranded tire porcelain firing technique), an expert enjoying special government allowances of the State Council, a big art craftsman in China's light industry, a master of Chinese art and industry, a master of Chinese traditional crafts, a master of arts and crafts in Henan Province, and an artistic director of Jiaozuo Jinguxuan Stranded Tire Porcelain Art Co., Ltd. He has been engaged in the development and research of stranded tire porcelain for more than 30 years, and has restored, inherited and developed the Danyangyu stranded tire porcelain firing technique that has been lost for nearly a thousand years. Four works, such as "Fruitful Fruit" and "Fruitful Fruit", have been selected as art textbooks for nine-year compulsory education; many works such as "Chinese Dragon" and "Peacock Kettle" have been treasured by major museums at home and abroad; and many works such as "Blossoming Rich and Noble" and "Harmony and Peace" have been included in the "Dictionary of Chinese Geographical Indication Protection Products".