(Question from East and West) Bai Fang: Why is Guang Embroidery called "a gift from China to the West"?
China News Service, Guangzhou, November 16th. Title: Bai Fang: Why is Guangxiu called "a gift from China to the West"?
China News Agency reporter Fang Weibin
Guang embroidery is one of the four famous embroidery in China. It is the general name of folk embroidery techniques in the Pearl River Delta with Guangzhou as the center.
During the Qing Dynasty, Guangzhou became a major trading port, and a large number of Guang embroidery exports were exported. This created a "Chinese style" in the West and was praised by Western scholars as "a gift from China to the West."
In the cultural exchanges between China and the West, Guang embroidery not only contains the characteristics of Lingnan culture, but also incorporates Western painting techniques.
Why is Guangxiu called "a gift from China to the West"?
Bai Fang, a doctor of history at Sun Yat-sen University, a research librarian, and director of the Guangdong Provincial Museum Exhibition Center, recently accepted an exclusive interview with China News Agency "Questions about East and West" to answer a series of questions in detail.
Data map: The audience visits the Guangzhou Embroidery Exhibition.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Du Yang
The summary of the interview record is as follows:
China News Agency reporter: As one of China's four famous embroidery, what are the characteristics of Guang embroidery? How is it different from the other three types of embroidery and the tide embroidery in Cantonese embroidery?
Bai Fang:
Cantonese embroidery features distinctive features. First, the composition is full; the second is the lively color, giving people a lively and festive feeling; the third is the subject matter involving Lingnan customs, auspicious patterns, such as Sanyang Kaitai, dragon and phoenix, lychee, Bergamot and so on.
Guang embroidery is good at keeping the "waterway", leaving a few millimeters of space between the embroidery pieces to make the embroidery surface stand out and the main image more eye-catching.
Guang embroidery relies on male embroidery workers to play the leading role is a major feature.
Especially in the Qing Dynasty, a large number of Chinese silk fabrics were exported to the West, which promoted the prosperity and development of Guangxi embroidery.
According to literature, during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, there were about 50 embroidery workshops and embroidery shops in Guangzhou, with more than 3,000 employees.
In order to manage the embroidery workshop and the embroidery village, a special guild was established, called Jinxiuhang.
The guild rules, and those who can join the guild are all men, called "flower men"; women are not allowed to show their faces and join the guild.
Currently in Guangdong, Mr. Xu Chiguang, who is nearly 90 years old, is the last "flower man" in the embroidery industry under the family inheritance for several generations.
The four major embroidery species in China are just like dialects, each region has a different "pronunciation".
Su embroidery focuses on literati embroidery, embroidering in the form of embroidery, embroidering cats is its characteristic.
Hunan embroidery is famous for embroidering tigers, Shu embroidery is famous for embroidering carp, and Guang embroidery is famous for embroidering Lingnan scenery.
In Cantonese embroidery, besides Guang embroidery, there is also tide embroidery. The subject of tide embroidery is mainly around clan ancestral halls. In terms of color, tide embroidery is more enthusiastic than Guang embroidery, using bright red and green colors. In terms of embroidery method, nail-gold embroidery is one of tide embroidery. Great feature.
Data map: Cantonese embroidered dark eight fairy auspicious bird and beast pattern happy account.
Photo by Yu Jing
China News Agency reporter: Why is Guangxiu called "a gift from China to the West"? Why is the Cantonese embroidered shawl called "Manila Shawl"?
Bai Fang: In the
Qing Dynasty, a large number of Chinese handicrafts were sold from Guangzhou to the West, including Guang embroidery.
The exquisite Cantonese embroidery became popular in the West.
At that time, in addition to exporting embroidery products, China also spread embroidery materials, embroidery stretches, embroidery frames and techniques to the West, which promoted the development of western embroidery techniques.
Therefore, Guang embroidery is called "a gift from China to the West".
There are many uses of Guang embroidery, in addition to decorative embroidery for home decoration, there are also practical embroidery.
Practical embroidery products include curtains, tablecloths, bedspreads, shawls, etc., mostly to meet the needs of the Western market, especially in the Americas, where locals have a soft spot for shawls.
The export products of Cantonese embroidered shawls are first shipped from Guangzhou to Macau, then to Manila, Philippines, then across the Pacific Ocean to Mexico, Peru and other places, and then transported to Spain and other European countries.
Long-distance transshipment made Westerners only know that shawls were shipped from the port of Manila, so in the West, shawls embroidered with wide embroidery are called "Manila shawls."
Data Map: Models show wide embroidered clothing.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Du Yang
China News Agency reporter: What is the export price of Canton Embroidery? How about the export situation? What is the position in the export products?
Bai Fang:
Among the handicrafts sold abroad at that time, silk fabrics were very expensive, and they were luxury items only owned by the royal family and aristocracy in the West.
There is a record in "Guangdong Customs History".
For example, one hundred catties of silk and silk will be levied two or two dollars in silver.
Among a large number of exported handicrafts, 100 ivory fans are taxed for only one dollar, which is high-grade and relatively expensive.
Through the tax ratio, we can also see the price difference at that time. The price of silk fabrics was the most expensive among various export crafts.
The Empress of China was the first American merchant ship to come to Guangzhou, and its captain was Green.
His trade list records that he bought two pieces of Cantonese embroidery at a total cost of 68 US dollars.
At that time, the average price for Westerners to buy an ivory fan was only $1, and the costly and delicately crafted fan was only $10.
From this example, we can also see that the price of Canton embroidery is very expensive among similar export commodities.
Most Canton Embroidery products are supplied for export.
In the 17th and 18th centuries, Chinese silk was everywhere in France and Italy, especially shawls, silk skirts and embroidered robes.
Around 1772, the sales of Cantonese shawls in Europe reached 80,000, of which France accounted for a quarter.
By 1776, sales had increased again, and only the English company had imported 104,000.
In addition to daily embroidery, embroidery paintings, embroidery screens, hanging accounts and other widely embroidered decorations are also exported in large quantities, and large-scale embroidery is more expensive.
Data map: Visitors experience Canton Embroidery.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Du Yang
Reporter from China News Service: What influence has Guangxiu exerted on the West in the process of cultural exchanges between China and foreign countries? Under the influence of Western culture, what changes and innovations have been made in Guang embroidery?
Bai Fang: The
theme of flowers and birds is a distinctive feature of Guang embroidery.
In the Qing Dynasty, a large number of flower and bird-themed embroidery products were sold to the West and were recognized by the Western society.
The West is very interested in this. In addition to clothing, they are also in love with flowers and birds.
Until now, the subject matter of Xinguang embroidery works is still dominated by flowers and birds.
The Guangdong Provincial Museum previously collected a treasure of wide-embroidered wall decoration from the UK, which is about three meters high and more than two meters wide.
This embroidery is the theme of flowers and birds. There are fifty or sixty kinds of flowers on the embroidery, as well as various rare birds and animals in pairs.
In addition, the embroidery tool round embroidery stretch also spread to the West.
At that time, embroidery was a manifestation of identity and education for Western women, and women with a certain status would learn to embroider the female celebrity.
It is worth noting that a major feature of Guang embroidery that is different from the other three famous embroidery is the tailor-made embroidery for the Western market.
Like the Manila shawl, traditional Chinese techniques combine the aesthetic needs of Western styles, shapes, and composition.
Whatever the Western market needs, China uses super-technologies to produce, process, and sell.
Portrait paintings of figures and religious themes in Western culture have enriched the embroidery methods and themes of Guangxi Embroidery.
In the composition of Western paintings, the contrast of light and dark shadows is emphasized, and the perspective ratio of distance and nearness is emphasized.
Guangxiu applied Western painting techniques to embroidery craftsmanship, enriching embroidery skills.
China News Agency reporter: What is the current situation of Guang Embroidery? What work has been done to inherit and carry forward the art of Guang embroidery? Do you have any suggestions for the inheritance and development of Canton Embroidery in the context of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area in the future?
Bai Fang: To
be honest, Guangzhou Embroidery is currently in a declining stage.
We need talent and financial support.
In terms of talents, one is to have time, and the other is to like it and be able to calm down and embroider one by one.
Although we are in the age of industrialization, non-genetic inheritance emphasizes the handicraft inheritance, which requires ingenuity and patience.
We have done some work in the inheritance and development of the art of Guang embroidery: rescued the oral history of Mr. Xu Chiguang, the last “flower man” in Guang embroidery; collected and arranged the needle techniques of Guang embroidery, and re-embroidered the old Guang embroidery. Leave it to future generations to learn and use; set up a wide embroidery master class in colleges and universities to blaze a new path that combines wide embroidery with academics; Guangdong Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center and Guangzhou Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center attach importance to the inheritance of wide embroidery For the communication work, the “Intangible Heritage New Creations” activity of Guang embroidery was held to encourage the works of new Guang embroidery artists to integrate with contemporary life, so that more people can understand Guang embroidery.
As a kind of cultural memory and inheritance, Cantonese embroidery is also a cultural bond connecting Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao.
The three places work together, hoping that through the attention of the government, the support of funds, the cultivation of talents, and the innovative development of Guang embroidery artists themselves, they will be in line with the current new era and create more new works that conform to contemporary aesthetics; and increase publicity and promotion. Let more people know and like Guang embroidery.
In the future, I hope Guang Embroidery can rejuvenate and develop vigorously.
(over)
About the interviewee:
Bai Fang, PhD in History, Sun Yat-sen University, research librarian, director of Guangdong Museum Exhibition Center.
Mainly engaged in the research of the history of the Guangdong Maritime Silk Road and the cultural relics research and exhibition curatorial work of Chinese export art in the 18th and 19th centuries.