Guiyang, 2 Feb (Xinhua) -- During the Spring Festival, the cold winds in the Wumeng Mountains were freezing, but at the home of Liao Liangqing, a villager in Mile Village, Dougu Town, Weining Yi Hui and Miao Autonomous County, Bijie City, Guizhou Province, the New Year's plan has been fiercely launched: Construction has begun to dig up soil for the new year. The 45-year-old Liao Liangqing is the inheritor of The Weining Sand Pottery Making Technique, a provincial intangible cultural heritage in Guizhou, and the only craftsman in Miller Village who still insists on sand pottery making. Some people call him the "Professor of Intangible Cultural Heritage" in the mountains, and he has an almost obsessive love for sand pottery making.
Liao Liangqing is showing off the sand pottery he made. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Liu Zhiqiang
For hundreds of years, Miller Village has made a living making sand pottery. Villagers carry the prepared sand pottery on their backs and horses, and walk the streets and alleys to sell. From childhood memories, sand pottery has been integrated into Liao Liangqing's life, he often stands by the fire pond, watching his father burn sand pottery. After a long time, he quickly learned to burn tea pots. Weininggu is called "Usa", and "Wusa Roasted Tea" is widely spread in the area of Wumeng Mountain, and many people use roasted tea cans from Miller Village to make "Wusa Roasted Tea". During the period of poverty alleviation, the silent "Wusa roasted tea" industry was revitalized, and Liao Liangqing, who had been working in Kunming for many years, was invited back to return to his old business.
Liao Liangqing said that in the past, roasted tea pots were the best-selling sand pottery products in the village. As the local saying goes, "The water rises and the tea can be spicy, and the skimmed tea is a good tea", which means that the tea cans used in the village of Miller are used to stir-fry tea, and the worst quality tea can also become delicious.
Liao Liangqing was thin and had deep eyes, sitting in front of the turntable to pull a blank, often sitting for more than ten hours. He always said he didn't feel tired, but some changes in his body showed his love of the craft: his arms were barely straight, and some of his fingers were almost flattened.
For Liao Liangqing, inheriting the art of sand pottery production is not only an "obsession", but also a way to awaken childhood. In his impression, unlike other quiet villages in the depths of the mountains, the night in Miller Village is full of the sound of "banging" of pulling bellows to burn sand pottery, and in order to preserve childhood memories, Liao Liangqing still keeps two earthen kilns in the backyard of the house, firing sand pottery in the most traditional way.
In recent years, with the help of his status as a non-hereditary heir, Liao Liangqing has walked out of the mountains and studied in Jingdezhen and other places. In his view, inheritance does not mean holding on to the defects or building behind closed doors, but should continue to explore and open up, and he firmly believes that innovation is the best way to inherit non-genetically. In the past, the roasted tea pot did not have a mouth, and he pinched out his mouth when pulling the blank to make it more practical and more beautiful; and the grass ash glaze he developed himself was made of crop straw, pine needles, etc. as raw materials, and the raw materials on the sand pottery were healthy and looked natural.
Liao Liangqing shows how to knead the shape of sand pottery. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Liu Zhiqiang
Liao Liangqing's family has been making pottery for at least 6 generations, and his father's local nickname is "small car plate", and uncle's nickname is "two-barrel can". Today, Liao Liangqing also has a nickname called "Liao Tea Pot". He said that the craft could not be lost and should be passed on, but what worried him most was that it would be difficult to find a suitable successor. Liao Liangqing said that making sand pottery is a very test of people's patience, and it is not good to be impetuous and impatient, so it is necessary to be really interested. For novices, if you want to fully master the skills, you need to learn at least 2 years, coupled with the low output of handicrafts and poor economic benefits, few people are willing to learn from teachers.
In order to better inherit, Liao Liangqing "touched the net" in middle age, using a short video platform to shoot and live broadcast to show his craftsmanship. Before the Spring Festival, he had just finished making more than 1,000 roasted tea cans and packing them up and sending them out. He said that in the new year, he will continue to stick to the sand pottery business he loves, hoping that more young people will learn this craft, do a good job in inheritance, and bring it to more places outside the mountains.