(Beijing Winter Olympics) The birth of the medals of the Beijing Winter Olympics: the five-ring "concentric" highlights the cultural heritage
China News Service, Beijing, October 26th, title: The birth of the medals of the Beijing Winter Olympics: the five-ring "concentric" highlights the cultural heritage
Author Chen Hang Xu Jing
On the 26th, at the site of "Together with the Future-100 Days Countdown to Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics", the medals of the Beijing Winter Olympics and Paralympics were officially released.
The picture shows the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics medals (front).
Photo courtesy of Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee
As an important part of the landscape elements of the Winter Olympics, where did the medal design inspiration for the Beijing Winter Olympics and Paralympics come from?
How does it condense the designer's ingenious ideas and brilliant ideas?
——Determine the "Five Rings Concentric" series of plans
In May 2020, medal designs for the Beijing Winter Olympics and Paralympics will be solicited from around the world.
Professor Hang Hai from the School of Design of the Central Academy of Fine Arts, product design teacher Li Wenlong, jewelry teacher Liu Xiao, and several students formed a medal design team.
They first formulated the basic strategy: First, it continued the jade culture concept of the "Golden Inlaid Jade" medal of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, reflecting the historical context of the city of Double Olympics.
The second is to carry out innovative designs for the shape of medals and try various possibilities.
Based on the concept of "Cangbi gifting heaven, Huang Cong gifting place", Li Wenlong and Liu Xiao led some students to create a medal design scheme with jade cong as the basic shape.
After repeated discussions, the "Five Rings Concentric" series of plans were determined, which were finally submitted to the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee with eight medal designs at the end of June 2020.
The picture shows the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics medals (rear).
Photo courtesy of Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee
——Shallowly carved ice and snow pattern and auspicious cloud pattern on the ring
More than two months later, the "Five Rings Concentric" program was shortlisted.
After repeated revisions, they simplified the four patterns into two, one is the auspicious cloud pattern, which is consistent with the core graphic auspicious cloud of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, reflecting the continuity of the Beijing Olympic heritage.
The other is the ice and snow pattern, which is derived from the ice plum pattern in traditional Chinese patterns. Plum blossoms are replaced with snowflakes to reflect the characteristics of ice and snow sports in the Beijing Winter Olympics.
The front of the medal is inspired by the ancient astronomical map, adding 24 stars and their trajectories, which symbolizes the vast starry sky, and also symbolizes the brilliance of the stars and the new glory of the ice and snow athletes.
At the same time, each ring on the front of the medal has been undulated to reflect the image of the ice and snow track.
——Ensure that athletes wear the right position
By viewing the video data of the previous Winter Olympics and the research on the medals of the previous Winter Olympics, the design team found that compared with the Summer Olympics, the Winter Olympics medals are generally too large. This is because the Winter Olympics athletes have heavy clothing and the medals are too small. Not eye-catching enough.
The picture shows the Beijing 2022 Paralympic Winter Games medals (front).
Photo courtesy of Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee
After repeated comparisons, physical proofing, and actual wear comparisons, the team set the medal diameter at 8.7 cm.
The length of the ribbons of the medals has also been tested to ensure that the athletes wear them in the most suitable position.
After the National Day holiday in 2020, according to the design team's recommendations, the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee commissioned the Shanghai Mint to conduct medal proofing and testing.
The Shanghai Mint was the producer of the "Golden Inlaid Jade" medal for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.
Xie Xinrui, the person in charge of proofing for the Winter Olympics medals, was also a proofing engineer for the "Golden Inlaid Jade" medal.
The picture shows the Beijing 2022 Paralympic Winter Games medals (rear).
Photo courtesy of Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee
Under the organization of the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee, the two teams of design and production started rounds of discussions around the proofing of medals.
For example, with regard to the surface texture processing of medals, the design team hopes that the surface of the medals should be shiny, but more restrained; the characters and patterns should be concavely carved, but the mirror surface should be bright, which contrasts with the soft luster of the surface and makes it easy to identify text information.
But this is different from the conventional coinage. It is either mirror-bright or matte. To meet the requirements of the design team, it must be polished by hand.
In the end, the Shanghai Mint, in line with the requirements of excellence, overcame technical difficulties and created the dignified, simple and generous Beijing Winter Olympics medals.
On July 13, 2021, the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee confirmed the final design and production of the medals.
——Mix the Olympic spirit and Chinese culture
The Beijing Winter Olympics medal "concentric" demonstrates the fusion of the Olympic spirit and the excellent Chinese culture: the card body is composed of a circle and a circle. The image is derived from the ancient Chinese concentric circle jade. There are five rings in total, which means that the five rings are concentric and concentric. The circle expresses the Chinese cultural connotation of "Heaven and Earth are in harmony, and people are in the same heart."
The front center of the Beijing Winter Olympics medal is engraved with the Olympic Five Rings logo, and the rings are lightly engraved with decorative patterns, all from traditional Chinese patterns.
Based on the principle of "the two Olympics are equally exciting", the Beijing Winter Paralympic Games medals and the Beijing Winter Olympic Games medals use the same image source, and the designs are in the same continuous line.
Medals are a tribute to the Olympic spirit and symbolize the glory of athletes.
After seeing the medal, the 17-year-old Beijing snowboarder Liu Zhenghui showed a look of desire.
She said that it is the dream of every winter athlete, especially young athletes like her, to win medals that symbolize honor at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympics.
For disabled athletes, the meaning of medals is even more special. Each medal contains sweat and tears.
(over)