Zhang Zongfan

01 · Lineage & Regional School

Zhang Zongfan, Male, Han, from Shaoyang, Hunan, is a fourth-batch national representative bearer of Bamboo Carving (Ⅶ-46). The tradition is documented in Shaoyang, Hunan. Within the regional tradition and school record of Bamboo Carving in Shaoyang, Hunan: Shaoyang bamboo carving has two main branches: bamboo-green carving and fanhuang (bamboo-veneer) carving. The Gazetteer of Baoqing Prefecture, compiled in the Ming Dynasty, records the circumstances of Pan Yilong, a renowned Baoqing bamboo carver of the Wanli era, and his bamboo works. During the Kangxi era of the Qing Dynasty, the Baoqing bamboo carver Wang Shangzhi invented the fanhuang (bamboo-veneer) technique and fanhuang bamboo carving. The craft once won a gold medal at the “Panama-Pacific International Exposition”; in 1950, the Government Administration Council specially selected eight Baoqing fanhuang bamboo-carving craftworks as gifts for Chairman Mao Zedong's visit to the Soviet Union to celebrate Stalin's birthday. Although this remarkable flower of folk art, Baoqing bamboo carving, repeatedly suffered severe damage during successive wars and in the 1960s, it survived tenaciously. But in the 1990s all nine bamboo-craft factories formerly in Shaoyang went bankrupt and closed, their technicians scattered across the country, and the twenty-odd veteran artisans still living are advanced in years.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Male, Han ethnicity, born in September 1968 in Wugang, Hunan Province. A senior arts and crafts artist and a Master of Arts and Crafts of Hunan Province. His works combine painting technique with knife work; their overall compositions carry the mood of classical Chinese painting, being elegant and graceful, brisk and airy. He has demonstrated his skills and exhibited his works at the Chengdu International Festival of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, the Shanghai World Expo, cross-strait cultural exchange events and other occasions. His fanhuang bamboo veneer carvings, including Xiaoxiang Shen Yun (Charm of the Xiao and Xiang Rivers), Ding Sheng (Flourishing Age), Hua Kai Fu Gui (Blossoms Bring Prosperity) and Sheng Shi Hua Kai (Flowers Blooming in a Prosperous Era), have won awards at national and provincial arts and crafts exhibitions. He published the monograph Baoqing Bamboo Carving Techniques. At the Shaoyang Special Education School he founded a training base for Baoqing bamboo carving talent, combining the transmission of a traditional craft with vocational training for people with disabilities. Within the documented technical tradition of Bamboo Carving in Shaoyang, Hunan: Shaoyang City, Hunan Province, was formerly called Baoqing Prefecture; it lies in southwestern Hunan and is the political, economic, and cultural center of the southwest of the province. Baoqing has a terrain of semi-mountainous, semi-hilly land, high in the west and low in the east; it abounds in moso bamboo (nanzhu), and its bamboo-ware industry has been highly developed since ancient times. It is one of the principal birthplaces of Chinese bamboo culture. Baoqing bamboo carving is a folk craft combining appreciation and utility that emerged from the craft of practical bamboo ware. When bamboo carving is made by this method, artisans remove the green skin and joints of the bamboo and strip out the bamboo veneer (huang); after boiling, drying, and rolling processes, they press it flat onto a wooden or bamboo body, then polish and sand it, and use different techniques to carve figures, landscapes, and flowers and birds on the surface. Bamboo-veneer carving has the color and luster of ivory and an elegant style; from the moment it appeared, it became a treasure avidly collected by officials, nobles, literati, and refined scholars, and was designated by the court as tribute and a diplomatic gift. Baoqing bamboo carving has a complete range of carving techniques, rich subjects, and distinctive methods; its knife techniques alone number more than twenty. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Archival Records of Process Steps": When bamboo carving is made by this method, artisans remove the green skin and joints of the bamboo and strip out the bamboo veneer (huang); after boiling, drying, and rolling processes, they press it flat onto a wooden or bamboo body, then polish and sand it, and use different techniques to carve figures, landscapes, and flowers and birds on the surface.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

He is a national representative bearer of bamboo carving (Baoqing bamboo carving), a fourth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. He is the last disciple of Zeng Jiantan, national bearer of Baoqing bamboo carving.

04 · Associated Heritage Item Dossier

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.

06 · Archival Sources & Bibliography

1. Zhang Zongfan · National Representative Bearer Archive