The four treasures of the traditional study room capture the new youth

The national tide is booming, and more and more post-90s and post-00s are embracing the four treasures of the literary room, practicing calligraphy, posting inscriptions, painting Chinese paintings, and getting close to the essence of national art. During the "Double Eleven" period in 2021, the four treasures of the study room, together with skis, outdoor power supplies, and archaeological blind boxes, were identified by the Tmall New Life Research Institute as the top ten trend items for consumers.

The boom in young people embracing the traditional art of calligraphy and painting stems from the ignited cultural self-confidence, the quality education that continues to be advocated, and the material conditions of the increasing prosperity of Chinese families.

The Four Treasures of The Literary Room: Tradition and national tide fly together

A red wall encloses the Chengtian Temple, an ancient pagoda of Western Xia and the Ningxia Art Museum. Outside the red wall are rows of old shops selling the four treasures of the study room, "Han MoXuan", "Han Fang Zhai", "Providence Cheng", "Hua Bao Zhai"... The name of the shop is simple, and the four treasures of the well-known ancient and modern study rooms such as lake pen, Xuan pen, Sheyan, Helan Yan, and emblem ink are placed among them.

This former place, which was mostly patronized by the elderly, adds youthful vitality. Xu Heping, the owner of Huabaozhai store, said that now the source of customers from preschool children to the elderly, "more and more young parents hope that their children can write a good hand, and attach great importance to their children's calligraphy education, so sometimes it is the post-00s and post-10s who come to choose things."

Lao Wang, the owner of Hanmoxuan, said that there are often teenagers who come to buy seal carved stones, and squatting in front of a pile of stones is half a day. "Some children pick really fine, to see whether there are small stone nails on the stone printing surface, the stone nails are hard, the seal carving knife cannot be carved, and the knife is slippery and easy to scratch the hand."

Non-hereditary heir Wang Gang using the ancient method to make ink ingots Lu Mengqi / Photo

In the four treasures of the study room, the brush is exquisitely made, the soft and hard hair, and the length of the pen edge greatly affect the writing experience, and most of the customers are willing to choose on the spot. Wang Dongxiang, the owner of Guoyi Pen Zhuang, said that in addition to the students who took calligraphy training classes to buy, there are many young people in their twenties and thirties who love calligraphy, know how to read goods, and can shop for goods according to the characteristics of the books they write, and have their own taste and elegance.

Of course, like many industries, these old stores that sell the four treasures of the literary house have also suffered from online sales in recent years. Many online stores rely on product design to gain the favor of the younger generation.

The Qingyi flagship store, which has been in operation for more than two years, has more than 50,000 fans and is included in the Taobao "Must Visit Good Stores" compilation album, focusing on the original national tide design of the four treasures of the literary room. The owner, Wang Weiji, was born in 1987 in Jing County, Xuancheng, Anhui Province. He said that customers are mainly post-80s and post-90s, some are for their own use, and some are bought for the children of the family. Among them, products such as "Cat's Claw Stone", "Meow Immortal Ink", "Ancient Style Creative Bookmark" and "Royal Cat Pen Shelf" are selling hot, and the most popular ancient style bookmarks have more than 6,000 customers place orders.

Cultural Innovation, "Redesign" of National Essence

The Four Treasures of Literature were once regarded as "the national essence of a small number of elites", so why can they get the favor of the younger generation?

Young entrepreneurs carry out "redesign" to promote traditional cultural products to become a new national trend. Many members of Wang Weiji's main creative team have worked in industries such as national comic creation and cinema film poster design, and are generally young and creative, and know what young people like. The popularity of the cat series of stationery supplies, in addition to the cute design can attract people, is also inseparable from the young generation's love for pets.

"Seeing the cat's claw yantai was instantly broken! It turns out that yantai can also be so cute, in stark contrast to the traditional yantai, and the pink meow fairy ink bottle is also super girl heart, bought for children to learn calligraphy!" A young mother who received the goods commented.

Many of the four treasures of the study room also realize the dream linkage, so that young people collect and use the four treasures of the study room with cultural symbols, and at the same time, they have an emotional connection to traditional culture. "The two sets of pens we are selling are jointly named with the Temple of Heaven, using elements such as the Temple of Heaven Divine Beast and the Temple of Heaven April Day. In the past, it has also been jointly named with the Forbidden City and the Imperial Examination Museum, and in the future, more joint models with cultural heritage will be developed to create a connection point between traditional culture and trendy design. Wang Wei said.

The development of quality education has spawned a campus calligraphy fever, so that more children have begun to lay rice paper and write "big characters". Since ancient times, China pays attention to the writing of Chinese characters, there are "characters like its people" and "a word is a thousand gold", with the school and parents attach importance to quality education, soft pen, hard pen and other calligraphy training is becoming increasingly popular. Especially after the "double subtraction", there is less written homework, and more children have time to "practice a good hand".

The daughter of Wu Qian, a citizen of Yinchuan, is 7 years old this year, and the elderly in the family will take her to pick up a sheep brush, and usually when grandma writes brush characters, the children will also practice italic strokes together next to them.

Yang Huifeng, a soft pen calligraphy teacher in Yinchuan, said that children who come to learn soft pen are 6 to 14 years old, especially in the winter and summer vacations, the number of students often increases by 1/3. "The more positive feedback the teacher gives in the classroom, the more interested they are, the more they love to write, and some lower grade children write in letters, put down the brush, and the hard pen can also write the edge of the pen."

Cultural self-confidence has enabled the art of calligraphy and painting to fly into the homes of ordinary people

Fang Chuxiong, a professor at the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts and a master of the Lingnan School, stressed that Chinese painting has unique genes and elements of the Chinese nation. "Chinese painting uses traditional brush and ink to express the world, which is very vital."

According to the statistics of "Art Chronicle", the number of calligraphy enrollments from 2020 to 2021 will increase by 50% at the Xi'an Academy of Fine Arts and 300% from the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts.

Cultural self-consciousness and cultural self-confidence enable more and more young people to know how to identify and pursue the beauty of the national essence. Studying in Milan, Italy, "Zhizhi", who studied fashion design, is a junior in college this year and likes all beautiful things. Since she was attracted to the art of calligraphy in August 2021, she has completed 134 times of learning to punch cards. She regularly posts to share her favorite pen and ink paper, pro post App, and when she buys exquisite and beautiful scrolls, she will also post "Amway". A blog post titled "Two Cups of Milk Tea Money To Open Self-Taught Calligraphy Cheats" summarized her order and experience, and received more than 4,000 likes and nearly 3,000 collections.

With the development of the country's economy and the increase of family wealth, more and more families tend to "pay for knowledge" and let their children receive a certain degree of art education.

The 26-year-old Sun Qiqi likes calligraphy and painting since childhood, and is deeply attracted by the fineness and charm of Gong Pen Painting and Xiao Kai, but she has not been able to learn systematically due to family conditions. As soon as she grew up and achieved financial independence, she studied calligraphy and painting and made her hobby a career. She opened her own calligraphy and painting studio next to the Lion Forest on Pingjiang Road in Gusu District, Suzhou City, and in addition to selling customized works, she also taught students Xiaokai on a daily basis. "I have high requirements for materials, pigments with traditional natural pigments, old pit ends, paper is mostly ancient handmade leather paper, pen has a fixed shop."

At the same time, Sun Qiqi opened the road of calligraphy and painting bloggers, operating the account "Gu Yunzai", 80% of her fans are women, and 70% of the post-90s and post-00s fan groups account for 70%. Relying on the Internet as information, many line manuscripts and inscriptions can be copied, and high-quality course resources are low-cost learning resources within easy reach.

The pen paints all things, and all things have a spirit. Under the shadow of the study lamp, between the pen and ink, Sun Qiqi not only depicts the charm of grass and trees, but also paints the enthusiasm of the young generation for the beauty of the national essence.

Source: Half Moon Talk Internal Edition, No. 4, 2022

Half Moon Talk Reporter: Ai Fumei Yang Qin | Editor: Zheng Xuejing

Editor-in-charge: Guo Yanhui

Proofreader: Huang Chenxi (Intern)