The "Covenant of Ice and Snow" arrived as scheduled. In Zhangjiakou City, Hebei Province, one of the winter Olympic games in Beijing, in a small town called Wei County, the art of paper-cutting meets ice and snow sports, what kind of "spark" will be rubbed between the two?
In the studio of Zhou Guang, the representative inheritor of the national intangible cultural heritage project Weixian paper-cutting, there are a variety of paper-cut works. He learned color work with his mother at the age of 7, knife work with his father at the age of 12, and drawing at the age of 15. "To learn to be a comprehensive paper-cutting artist, you must draw, engrave and dye three all-rounders." Zhou Guang remembered his father's teachings, and for decades he worked hard and hard, and eventually became a generation of "paper-cutting masters".
Zhou Guang displayed the certificate of representative inheritor of the national intangible cultural heritage project paper-cutting (Weixian paper-cutting), behind which was his paper-cut works. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Cao Guochang
Zhou Guang, 71, is full of spirits and talks about paper-cutting: "The Chinese culture in paper-cutting is broad and profound, and it is also one of the ways for foreigners to understand China. Recently, he led his apprentices and workers to complete thousands of paper-cut books, covering the zodiac signs, faces and so on.
Since Beijing joined hands with Zhangjiakou to bid for the Winter Olympics, it has used paper-cutting art to show the great rivers and mountains and culture of its hometown to the world, which has become the same mission as The paper-cutting artists in Weixian County like Zhou Guang.
In recent years, Gao Youliang, the inheritor of the provincial intangible cultural heritage of Weixian Paper-cutting, has created more than 200 paper-cut works, including "Frozen" and "Passion Winter Olympics". He said that it is his wish to use the paper-cutting skills of his hometown to cheer and bless the Beijing Winter Olympics and tell the Olympic complex of the Chinese.
In fact, not only in Wei County, but also paper-cutting artists across the country have also picked up scissors and carving knives to use paper-cutting art to present gifts to the Beijing Winter Olympics.
At the Ulsan Museum, paper-cut works from all over the country are on display. Li Xinwei, director of the museum, said that their recent paper-cutting art festival with the theme of "Passionate Winter Olympics, Ribbon-Cutting Ice and Snow" collected a total of 403 works from 27 provinces across the country, such as Hebei's "Gathering at the Foot of the Great Wall, Blooming Ice and Snow Passion", Shanxi's "Hedongwa Panning the Winter Olympics", Gansu's "Colorful Ice and Snow, the Most Beautiful Camel", etc. Although these works have different styles, they all express good wishes for the Beijing Winter Olympics.
Weixian paper-cutting originated from the "window flower", which was originally an ornament that people pasted on the window during the New Year. Nowadays, weixian "window flowers" go down the window, and gradually derive colorful cultural gifts, tourist souvenirs and art collections, etc., and the creative themes involve more than 6,000 varieties of flowers, birds, fish and insects, opera characters, myths and legends, historical stories, drama faces, etc., carrying traditional Chinese culture to the world.
In the "Paper-cutting Hou" studio in Weixian County, paper-cutting artists are making paper-cut works. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Cao Guochang
Statistics show that there are 1,100 paper-cutting professional households in Weixian County, more than 30,000 related employees, and more than 6 million sets of paper-cutting are produced annually, which sell well in more than 100 countries and regions such as the United States, Japan, and Germany.
Not only that, weixian paper-cutting art has also entered some school classrooms. Shijiazhuang Wai Chinese School has opened a paper-cutting class in Wei County since 2014. Principal Pei Hongxia said: "So far, more than 23,000 students have studied the course, and the students' paper-cutting works have become special gifts to friends from all over the world who visit the school, and more than 1,600 teachers and students from more than 10 countries have participated in the paper-cutting experience when they visited. (Reporters Cao Guochang, Liu Taoxiong, Du Fang)