The Olympic Games is a stage for the world's athletes to compete, as well as a platform for friendly exchanges between athletes and people from various countries and regions. Through each Olympic logo, mascot, souvenir, and artwork created around the Olympic Movement, you can see the global cultural exchange and cultural convergence that this remarkable event brings.
Historically, Olympic-related gifts have basically covered the artistic design styles, artistic concepts, cultural backgrounds and good wishes of countries in the world, involving various materials and technologies, and these licensed goods and souvenirs reflect the aesthetic requirements and etiquette norms of the host country. Chinese culture has a long history and is endless, and our ancestors contributed great "porcelain art" to the world. China is the land of porcelain, and China is also derived from it. "The Art of Porcelain" epitomizes an oriental aesthetic norm formed by the etiquette and beauty of utensils, which is implicit, practical, aesthetic and ceremonial, and is a Chinese ideal born in the utensils.
The Beijing Winter Olympics is a dream come true for ice and snow athletes around the world, and it is also an important stage to showcase Chinese culture and China's image. In 2015, when China bid to host the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, my work "Red Rhymes – Flying Around" became China's national gift to the International Olympic Committee and was collected by the International Olympic Committee. "Red Rhyme - Flying Around" is a large instrument with a diameter of nearly 50 centimeters, rich in color, and "Red Rhyme" means "great luck" and carries the blessings of Beijing's Olympic bid.
▲ Wenjun bottle (ceramic) Bai Ming
I especially hope that the big stage of the Olympic Games will appear on the big stage of the Olympic Games to make everyone shine with gifts from China. Such gifts should have distinct characteristics of Chinese artifacts and Chinese etiquette, and at the same time be very novel, presenting new designs, new appeals, new craftsmanship and new expressions. On January 7, my design for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games was released. Wenjun bottle takes Dehua white porcelain as the carrier, integrates the essence of Chinese porcelain culture and the modern Olympic spirit, and shows the Olympic elements on the crystal clear porcelain. Its shape is derived from the traditional Chinese plum bottle, and also contains the common characteristics of many classic Chinese utensils. I want to decompose the concept of the Winter Olympics and the characteristics of sports into pure, white, speed, smooth, beautiful, blended and cooperative, hoping that they can be integrated into a relatively subtle but beautiful shape, which is also the most important inspiration brought to me by traditional culture.
China is the country of poetry, but also the country of porcelain. Porcelain and poetry are not directly expressing the external characteristics of a certain thing, but more of an emotional transformation and the expression of sincerity, aesthetic beauty and deep love, which embodies the cultural literacy and aesthetic spirit of an ethnic group as a whole. Dehua white porcelain has the same color and quality as jade, its purity is a unique understanding process of our ancestors on the soil, through continuous pottery washing, the mud becomes a pure white color that does not seem to contain any color, and the Chinese understanding of white is different from all countries in the world, not a white that is nothing, but contains all things, full of warmth like jade warmth, and a beautiful white with a sense of life breathing.
For hundreds of years, Chinese white porcelain has spread across regions and civilizations, and has been shared by the world, and it is not only a daily utensil close to life, but also a noble and elegant decoration, or a religious ritual symbolizing holiness and respect. From East Asia, Southeast Asia to South Asia, to East Africa and West Asia Arab countries, and finally to Portugal, the Netherlands and France and other European countries, along the sea porcelain road to bring the quiet beauty and friendliness of Chinese porcelain to the world. The stunning West gave it a romantic and intuitive name – "Chinese White".
The history of Chinese ceramics has contributed countless exquisite skills and exquisite materials to the world, and also contributed to the aesthetics of the most systematic, contemporary and closely related utensils in history. "Chinese white" class ice like snow, Dehua white porcelain such as jade texture better presents the elements of the Winter Olympic ice and snow, I used the traditional Chinese modeling elements, designed a novel Wenjun bottle, with the abstract literati gentleman's bottle design to represent the image of the country where thousands of years of culture has been flowing - dignified, calm, open-minded and heroic, inclusive, and has a very beautiful meaning. The clean and elegant standing shows the gentle and elegant Chinese atmosphere.
The slender bottle body and flowing lines of the work echo the elegant, dexterous and rhythmic shapes of ice and snow sports. Winter Olympic Wenjun bottle body relief Winter Olympic Emblem, darkly engraved 24 vertical lines, symbolizing the 24th Winter Olympic Games; Winter Paralympic Wenjun bottle body relief Winter Paralympic Emblem, carved 13 vertical lines, symbolizing the 13th Winter Paralympic Games, 13 lines for the Yang sculpture design, the two works complement each other, both consistent and morphological differences. The lines of carved lines and yang carvings form a looming lotus petal shape at the bottom, implying harmony and auspiciousness.
I want to return Wenjun bottle to the depths of our more confident cultural tradition - low-key but elegant temperament, subtle but romantic rich, not ostentatious, the color is pure to a single and rich white color, but it also presents the heat of fire to confirm it, forming a noble and uncompromising spiritual temperament. The whole work has no other colors, including the Winter Olympic and Paralympic monograms, which are also pure porcelain colors. Such a simple color, both ancient and modern, rarely appears in other Olympic ceremonies, licensed goods and souvenirs. I will blend the logo into the whole shape, looming, and when I get close to it, its craftsmanship and refinement will be revealed. In terms of styling, I pursue a very wonderful smoothness, because the smoothness is related to the speed, the line of the bottle body is equally spaced, bringing the association of the track, and the white porcelain is related to the spirit of ice and snow sports. I hope to turn my understanding of the Beijing Winter Olympic Games, the Winter Paralympic Games and Chinese culture into perceptible and visual artifacts, bring associations through vision, convey wishes, feel the origin and beauty of Chinese culture, and let the cultural background corresponding to "Chinese white" be slowly released.
The Olympic Games are a great event of cooperation, and the design concept of Wenjun Bottle has been strongly supported by licensed manufacturers and the Beijing Winter Olympic Organizing Committee. I think such a work is a common work of people who are full of yearning and expectations for the Olympic Games, and it is a gift from all participants to the Beijing Winter Olympics. The cooperation itself is a manifestation of the Olympic spirit, and I hope that this work will be passed on to the hands of various Olympic families, and I hope that the cultural goodwill and modern beauty it carries will continue to produce value with the holding of the Olympic Games.
February 13, 2022 China Culture Daily
The 3rd edition featured a special report
"Winter Olympic Wenjun Bottle: Conveying Chinese Poetry in the Language of Porcelain"
Editor-in-charge: Chen Xiaoyue