Jin Wen
01 · Lineage & Regional School
Jin Wen, Male, Unspecified, from Nanjing, Jiangsu, is a third-batch national representative bearer of Craftsmanship of Nanjing Yunjin Brocade (Ⅷ-13). The tradition is documented in Nanjing, Jiangsu. Within the regional tradition and school record of Craftsmanship of Nanjing Yunjin Brocade in Nanjing, Jiangsu: Yunjin production is now mainly distributed across five districts of Nanjing: Qinhuai, Jianye, Baixia, Xuanwu, and Qixia. After the southward migration of the Northern Song, Nanjing became the silk-weaving center of China. The weaving of gold ornament into Nanjing yunjin brocade began around the Yuan dynasty, while colored zhuanghua gold brocade flourished in the Ming and Qing dynasties. During the Kangxi to Jiaqing reigns of the Qing dynasty, Nanjing yunjin production was on an enormous scale: there were more than thirty thousand wooden looms, over two hundred thousand people made their living from the trade, annual output exceeded one million bolts of brocade, and the value of production was more than thirty million taels of silver. At the end of the Guangxu reign the yunjin industry began to decline; when Nanjing was liberated in 1949, only four looms in the whole city could still produce yunjin.
02 · Mastery & Signature Works
Male, of Hui ethnicity, he was born in October 1954 in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. He is a representative bearer of the Craftsmanship of Nanjing Yunjin Brocade, a third-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. He is a Chinese Arts and Crafts Master. In November 1973 he entered the arts and crafts industry and had the good fortune to study under the last ten or so veteran Yunjin artisans, mastering the full repertoire of Yunjin weaving and researching and reproducing a large number of ancient brocades. In 2000 he was named a Jiangsu Province Arts and Crafts Notable by the Jiangsu Provincial Economic and Information Commission. He has been engaged for more than forty years in Yunjin creation and research on ancient silk weaving, and has led or taken part in more than ten national, provincial and municipal research projects. He formerly served as director of the Traditional Craft Research Office of the Folklore Institute of the Nanjing Museum. Within the documented technical tradition of Craftsmanship of Nanjing Yunjin Brocade in Nanjing, Jiangsu: Among ancient silk textiles, "jin" (brocade) represents the highest level of technical achievement. Nanjing yunjin distills the essence of Chinese silk-weaving craftsmanship and is one of the three famous brocades of ancient China. More than fifteen hundred years ago, historical records already contained written accounts of Nanjing silk textiles, but no physical pieces have been handed down. At the end of the Eastern Jin, Nanjing had a special institution for producing brocade—the Douchang Jin Office. Nanjing yunjin is woven by hand on the traditional large-pattern wooden loom (dahualou mu zhi ji), with a pattern-hauler (zhuaihua gong) and a weaver (zhishou) working in close coordination. This work is physically demanding and calls for a high level of skill. Old artisans summarize the pattern-hauling technique in a mnemonic verse—"one swing, two press, three copy, four join, five lift, six cup, seven pull, eight scoop, nine scatter"—while the weaver must tread the sheds open with the feet, throw the shuttle with the hands, recite the mnemonics with the mouth, work out the color scheme in the mind, watch every movement, and coordinate the whole body. The main varieties of yunjin fall into four great categories: zhijin (gold-weft brocade), kujin, kuduan, and zhuanghua (polychrome brocade). The first three can already be produced by modern machinery, but the "wahua panzhi" (excavated-flower disc weaving) and "zhuhua yise" (a different color for each flower) of zhuanghua can still be executed only by hand. Nanjing yunjin is rich in cultural and scientific content and can provide concrete evidence for the history of Chinese craft, the history of science and technology, and cultural history. With the development of modern technology, new silk fabrics are constantly appearing and apparel fabrics are being replaced ever faster, reducing market demand for yunjin; moreover, the apprenticeship period for yunjin is long and the labor intensive, so young people are mostly unwilling to take up the work, and the zhuanghua hand-weaving craft is on the verge of being lost. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "The tall wooden drawloom": The tall wooden drawloom is over twenty feet high: the drawboy upstairs lifts the warp threads called for by the pattern while the weaver below treads the shed and throws the shuttle. "Drawboy and weaver in coordination": Every brocade figure depends on two people working in step: the drawboy lifts harnesses on the caller's commands while the weaver treads and throws the shuttle in sync. "The nine drawloom calls": Nine calls — whip, press, scoop, close, raise, hold, draw, delve, scatter — encode each harness movement, serving as the loom's unwritten command language. "Excavated brocade weaving": The heart of the brocade technique: float threads are excavated to open the figured areas, which are then filled in colour by colour, guided purely by experience.
The tall wooden drawloom
The tall wooden drawloom is over twenty feet high: the drawboy upstairs lifts the warp threads called for by the pattern while the weaver below treads the shed and throws the shuttle.
Drawboy and weaver in coordination
Every brocade figure depends on two people working in step: the drawboy lifts harnesses on the caller's commands while the weaver treads and throws the shuttle in sync.
The nine drawloom calls
Nine calls — whip, press, scoop, close, raise, hold, draw, delve, scatter — encode each harness movement, serving as the loom's unwritten command language.
Excavated brocade weaving
The heart of the brocade technique: float threads are excavated to open the figured areas, which are then filled in colour by colour, guided purely by experience.
03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status
In 2009, Jin Wen was announced in the third batch of national representative bearers for Craftsmanship of Nanjing Yunjin Brocade, with Nanjing, Jiangsu as the declared area. Within the documented safeguarding record of Craftsmanship of Nanjing Yunjin Brocade in Nanjing, Jiangsu: The project was inscribed in the national inventory in 2006 (batch 1), with Nanjing, Jiangsu as its declared area, and Nanjing Yun Jin Research Institute Co., Ltd. as its safeguarding unit. Since the project was inscribed in the national inventory, its declared area and safeguarding unit have carried out documentation, transmission and presentation within the national safeguarding framework. Together, the inventory record and the project archive form the public documentary basis for the bearer’s transmission practice.
04 · Associated Heritage Item Dossier
Historical origin
After the southward migration of the Northern Song, Nanjing became the silk-weaving center of China. The weaving of gold ornament into Nanjing yunjin brocade began around the Yuan dynasty, while colored zhuanghua gold brocade flourished in the Ming and Qing dynasties.
05 · Fellow National Bearers Lineage
National representative bearers recorded under the same item code, ordered from the first to the sixth batch. Batch order is not a teacher–student relationship.
| Bearer | Declared area | Roster code | Relation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Zhu Feng | Nanjing, Jiangsu | 01-0131 | Same declared area |
| Zhou Shuangxi | Nanjing, Jiangsu | 03-1307 | Same declared area |
| Jin Wen | Nanjing, Jiangsu | 03-1308 | This page |
| Guo Jun | Nanjing, Jiangsu | 05-2728 | Same declared area |
06 · Archival Sources & Bibliography
This static English edition is rendered at the edge for search engines, AI crawlers and readers without JavaScript. Compiled from official national representative bearer archival records and the associated project dossier, organized by topic and translated into English. 阅读中文版。