Lin Shunkui

01 · Lineage & Regional School

Lin Shunkui, Male, Han, from Yueqing, Zhejiang, is a fifth-batch national representative bearer of Lantern Art (Ⅶ-50). The tradition is documented in Yueqing, Zhejiang. Within the regional tradition and school record of Lantern Art in Yueqing, Zhejiang: With its folk cultural value and strong ornamental appeal, the Yueqing shoushi dragon has long been loved by the local people. Every year around the Lantern Festival, grand shoushi dragon parades are held locally, with people hoping that the dragon will bring favorable weather and abundant harvests. Jiang Huai's Qihai Suotan of the Ming dynasty records that at that time Yueqing widely circulated the practice of “villagers pasting paper to form a dragon's head and tail, cutting boards for its body, with a windlass mechanism turning it and lanterns set on top, accompanied by gongs and drums, going from door to door to solicit rewards — this was called the dragon-boat lantern.”

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Male, of Han ethnicity, born in June 1956 in Yueqing, Zhejiang Province. In 1972 he began learning carving techniques at the Yueqing Boxwood Carving Factory. From 1985 he worked with his father Lin Bangdong at the Yueqing Special Arts and Crafts Carving Factory, making ornate dragon lanterns and fine-line paper cuttings, and his skills matured year by year. He persists in making the ornate dragon lanterns from wooden gears and bamboo. His core production remains based on traditional techniques while integrating mechanical, electrical, neon, transmission and decorative arts technologies; each year he makes six or seven ornate dragon lanterns and more than ten flat dragons. He integrates instruction into the actual process of making, teaching the craft hand in hand. Within the documented technical tradition of Lantern Art in Yueqing, Zhejiang: The Yueqing shoushi dragon is a folk lantern art spread across Yueqing City, Zhejiang Province, found in such places as Beibaixiang Town, Liushi Town, and Wengyang Subdistrict. Yueqing's ancient Wu-Yue folk heritage, its strong maritime cultural atmosphere, and the character of its merchant culture, together with its special geographical position and cultural background, are the foundation on which this project was born. The craft of making the Yueqing shoushi dragon has a history of more than 400 years. Its production process is complex, combining the techniques of woodworking, oil painting, papier-mâché (paper modeling), dragon-lantern making, and paper carving. In the production process several different techniques are interwoven; it is a comprehensive traditional handicraft. Making a single shoushi dragon takes at least half a year to complete. A shoushi dragon is generally 5 meters long, 3 meters high, and 2 meters wide; the dragon's body is divided into four tiers, and its four sides are mounted with the exquisite Yueqing fine-line paper carvings known as “dragon-boat flowers.” On the dragon's body are more than 80 pavilions and terraces, condensing more than 80 plays such as Investiture of the Gods and Journey to the West, with nearly 300 figures ancient and modern, in different poses and from all walks of life. Gear-driven mechanisms are hidden inside the whole dragon lantern; when the handle is turned, all the figures come vividly to life. The detailed modeling inside the shoushi dragon includes scenes of 36 old trades such as flour milling, blacksmithing, and fortune-telling — full of delightful charm, like one living picture of folk customs after another, embodying a broad popular character and rich cultural depth. The Yueqing shoushi dragon contains rich folk and regional cultural connotations and is renowned along the coast of southern Zhejiang for its ingenious form and superb production craft. As a lantern art combining sacrifice, parade, viewing, and entertainment, the Yueqing shoushi dragon plays an active role in promoting the wide circulation of folk literature, historical storytelling, and classical opera, and in meeting the spiritual and cultural needs of the people. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "The Ming record of the dragon-boat lantern": Jiang Huai's Ming miscellany describes the dragon-boat lantern of Yueqing, from which the jewelled dragon evolved. "Four storeys of carved paper flowers": Typically 5 m long, 3 m high and 2 m wide in four storeys, it carries over eighty miniature pavilions and some three hundred figures. "Gear drives and the thirty-six trades": Hidden gear trains turn the figures when a handle is cranked, and thirty-six traditional trades are staged inside as miniature scenes. "The Lin family lineage": Passed on mainly within families, the Lin and Zhu being the most representative; Lin Shunkui learned carving from 1972 and works with wooden gears and bamboo.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

He is a representative bearer of Lantern Art (Yueqing Ornate Dragon Lanterns), a fifth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. His ornate dragon lanterns were shown at the Second Exhibition of Achievements in Safeguarding China's Intangible Cultural Heritage and were collected by the China Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center of the Chinese Academy of Arts, while his fine-line paper cuttings Shuihu Yibai Ling Ba Jiang (The 108 Heroes of the Water Margin) and Wushi Liu Minzu (Fifty-Six Ethnic Groups) were collected by the Zhejiang Provincial Museum. He currently has three apprentices and fifteen trainees.

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. Lin Shunkui · National Representative Bearer Archive