Chinanews.com, Tianjin, January 3rd, title: The root of folk art lies in the countryside-an interview with Chinese paint master Lu Tong
Chinanews reporter Zhang Daozheng
A piece of ordinary clay flickers and turns in the hand and becomes a character in each story. This is the charm of Chinese folk art clay sculpture.
Speaking of clay sculptures, Tianjin’s "Clay Figure Zhang" is well-known at home and abroad.
A reporter from Chinanews.com recently interviewed Lu Tong, a Chinese paint master and senior craft artist at the Tianjin clay figurine Zhang’s paint studio, and asked him to tell a legend.
Lu Tong, the owner of Jinbang, and the owner of the mud house, was born in Ningjin, Shandong and was born in Tianjin in 1945.
He has been in the art of colored sculpture for more than 60 years. His masterpieces such as "Man in the Mountain", "Chunjiang Flower Moon Night", "Dream of Red Mansions Colored Sculpture" series of colored sculptures "Jin Ping Mei" and "Wine Culture" have successively won awards and special exhibitions at home and abroad, causing a sensation.
He has visited many times and has been met and commended by the heads of state of Singapore and other countries.
"The root of Chinese folk art is still in the countryside." Looking back at 60 years of artistic creation career, Lu Tong said with emotion: "I was able to succeed because I never left the market life and absorbed nutrients from various Chinese traditional cultures. With the broad spirit of Chinese culture, folk artists must have cultural confidence."
Hong Kong director Li Hanxiang sketches for Lu Tong.
Photo by Zhang Daozheng
"The Man in the Mountain" became famous when he was young, and his style is changing with the times
Lu Tong became involved with colored sculptures at the age of 14 and became famous all over the country at the age of 19.
In 1960, he applied for the art examination, but was admitted by Clay Figure Zhang Caisu Studio as the first batch of students. He studied under Zhang Ming, the fourth generation heir of "Clay Figure Zhang".
In 1964, he went to Dazhai Village, Jinzhong, Shanxi in the "Agricultural Study of Dazhai", and created the work "Man in the Mountain" which caused a sensation in the national art circle.
First, it was selected for national art exhibitions, and then published on the cover of "Fine Arts" magazine and collected by the National Art Museum of China.
Lu Tong recalled that at that time, the famous sculptor and author of the "Wuchang Uprising" of the Monument to the People's Heroes, Fu Tianchou wrote an article in the "People's Daily", saying that it "achieved a breakthrough in the representation of major realistic themes of folk colored sculptures".
The encouragement of the master made Lu Tong fall in love with this folk art, and he also found a direction in his creation, which is rooted in tradition, but must go deep into life and be close to the people.
Lu Tong said that his own work and knowledge came from Master Zhang Ming, “He is very open-minded and always encourages students to make works different from the traditional clay figurine Zhang.”
With this kind of enlightenment, Lu Tong pursued innovation and change throughout his life, but never left the traditional Chinese culture.
He set his sights on the masterpieces of Chinese classical literature, and created large series of works such as "Jin Ping Mei", "Dream of Red Mansions", "Liquor Culture", "Jingu Water Transport Map" and other large-scale group works, which are easy to understand, yet unconventional and lifelike. Each work arouses Sensational effect.
Lu Tong displays a plaque of non-genetic inheritors with his works behind him.
Photo by Zhang Daozheng
"Jin Ping Mei" was a sensation, the creation turned to classical masterpieces
In an exclusive interview with Lu Tong, the colored sculpture "Jin Ping Mei" has become a must-talk chapter.
This series of masterpieces covering more than 200 characters has become one of Lu Tong's masterpieces, making him famous overseas.
"I like classic Chinese classics very much, and the characters in the classics are also one of my main creative directions." Lu Tong said, "Jin Ping Mei" is China's first novel depicting market characters and secular customs. The characters in it are all from Real life in the market, "This coincides with my creative direction."
With his love and observation of folk life, as well as a deep understanding of masterpieces, Lu Tong reproduced many classic scenes in "Golden Ping Regret" with skillful techniques and ingenious ideas. The characters are vivid, and the clothing and props are vivid. The characteristics of the times.
"It was very difficult to buy the book "Jin Ping Mei" back then." Lu Tong said with a smile. At that time, in order to buy the book, he had a lot of relationships, and he also asked the unit to open a letter of introduction.
The carefully created group of "Golden Bottle Regrets" is a masterpiece of folk art in the new era.
Lu Tong adopts a series of forms, boldly blending the strong local flavor of folk art with Western body art expression techniques, forming a rough, exaggerated, unrestrained, elegant, and interesting style.
His works have won many awards at home and abroad and enjoy a high reputation at home and abroad.
Later, Lu Tong continued to create works such as "A Dream of Red Mansions", "Liquor Culture", "Jingu Caoyun Map" and other works, which laid a distinctive and unique mark for his creation during this period.
He showed reporters the small wine bottles of the twelve golden hairpins of "A Dream of Red Mansions", exquisitely beautiful.
Lu Tong said that this group of works was invited by the Yibin Red Mansion Distillery. With reference to the original work written by Cao Xueqin, according to the character of the twelve golden hairpins in "A Dream of Red Mansions", twelve "Golden Hairpin Wine Bottles" were designed. Fired by a famous teacher in Zibo, Shandong.
Porcelain bottles will never be manufactured after being fired in a limited amount.
Nowadays, the twelve porcelain bottles of "Golden Hairpin Wine" are recognized by the porcelain collectors as "exquisite works" and are of great value.
Colored sculptures as a matchmaker, Qiyi became attached to Li Hanxiang
Because of the "Jin Ping Mei" colored sculpture, Lu Tong also met Li Hanxiang, a famous Hong Kong director.
Li Hanxiang has shot a large number of Fengyue movies, and has created several times on the theme of "Jin Ping Mei.
“It’s no accident that I met Li Hanxiang.” Lu Tong recalled that in 1992, his paintings of Jin Ping Mei were exhibited in Xuzhou, Guangzhou and Singapore’s National Museum of Cultural Heritage. They were recommended by domestic and foreign media, and Li Hanxiang soon learned about this Hong Kong university. The director found Lu Tong through Hu Wenbin of the Chinese Society of Dreams of Red Mansions, and had the first meeting with Li Hanxiang at the house of Tuanjiehu Shuizi in Beijing at that time.
It is the first time for Lu Tong to see the home of a great director who is "magnificent".
However, Li Hanxiang's kind smile, witty and charming conversation, quickly calmed Lu Tong's panic.
"He talked about the art of "Jin Ping Mei" straightforwardly. He watched my "Jin Ping Mei" colored sculpture pictures with great interest and spoke out and praised him. He also introduced his creation and ideas of "Jin Ping Mei" in the movie." Lu Tong told reporters that since that day Later, Li Hanxiang called him to Beijing every time he went to Beijing. Later, he found a set of Beijing flyover materials and asked Lu Tong to model the "eight monsters of flyovers."
Lu Tong recalled that Li Hanxiang was full of energy and could not see the word fatigue in him. As a newspaper columnist, he had to write, proofread, and publish articles every day.
In 1993, when he was 67 years old, he was invited to participate in the 2nd International Symposium on Jinpingmei held in Zaozhuang, Shandong. At the meeting, he expressed his long-cherished wish: to make three movies "Gold", "Bottle", "Mei" and Jinpingmei forty episodes in his lifetime. Television series.
After the meeting, he took Lu Tong to Linqing for a field investigation, and ambitiously planning with the local government to build a Jinpingmei Cultural City as his shooting base.
However, these ideas can no longer be realized with the death of Li Hanxiang.
Lu Tong took out the portrait drawn by Li Hanxiang, and missed this old friend in his tone.
Continuous creation, promoting non-genetic inheritance
This year, Lu Tong, who is over the past few years old, continues to create, and he goes to the studio to make new creations every day.
"I don't have any other hobbies, just like clay. Back then, the masters passed on the art to me, and I also want to pass on this art to future generations." Lu Tong said that before, many people thought that clay sculptures were not elegant, but New China gave folk art a new brilliance.
In 60 years of art, Lu Tong believes that the national is the world, and the art rooted in the countryside and folk is the realism and reflection of life, and it will also receive the emotional resonance and recognition of the whole world.
"All human beings will have a common humanity."
Lu Tong recalled that in 1991, when Singapore’s Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong saw Lu Tong’s works, he invited him to the Presidential Palace as a guest. The two chatted for 40 minutes; in 1996, after the Danish royal family collected Lu Tong’s works, Margaret II The Queen of the World wrote back and praised that "this is an excellent example of traditional Chinese figure painting art, which will be appreciated by many people and is also a symbol of Sino-Denmark friendship."
He told reporters that after Zhilang Nancun, an old friend of Premier Zhou Enlai and vice chairman of the China-Japan Friendship Association, had become associated with the clay figurine Zhang Caisu, he had been to Tianjin for many years and invited Lu Tong to create works and became a "big collector" of Lu Tong's works.
"Shiro Nancun was born and lived in China. He misses the life of the Chinese people very much." Lu Tong said that when going overseas for exhibitions and exchange activities, he often meets overseas Chinese and people who are friendly to China. They see Lu Tong's colored sculptures will cry with excitement, thinking that they seem to have seen real people and real lives in China.
Today, as a national-level non-inherited inheritor, Lu Tong hopes that this skill can continue to be passed on. For this reason, he is widely discipled and warned his disciples: "Folk art cannot be separated from life, cannot be separated from the people. This is the root of folk culture. ."(Finish)