Zhang Xiaohong

01 · Lineage & Regional School

After being made redundant from a state-owned enterprise in 2002, she went to Tianjin, Suzhou and other places to study the craft, and on returning to her home town she founded the Bailing Embroidery Studio and began researching and creating grass-cloth embroidery. Within the regional tradition and school record of Minjianxiuhuo in Xinyu, Jiangxi: Developing productive protection of xiabu embroidery can provide employment opportunities for local communities, especially for women’s groups, increase household economic income, and raise living standards and family status; at the same time it can raise the value-added content of ramie and increase the income of ramie growers, thereby contributing to local economic and social development. Xiabu embroidery originated in the Northern Song dynasty.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Female, Han ethnicity, born in April 1958 in Ruichang, Jiangxi Province. A National March Eighth Red Banner Pacesetter, a national technical expert and a master of arts and crafts of Jiangxi Province. She learned embroidery from her elders from early childhood. She subsequently founded the Yuzhou Embroidery Workshop, the Xinyu Grass-Cloth Embroidery Art Research Institute and the Grass-Cloth Embroidery Museum, and registered five trademarks, including Xia Xiu and Yuzhou Xiufang, and forty-six patents, including one for a grass-cloth craft article provided with an embroidered layer. Within the documented technical tradition of Minjianxiuhuo in Xinyu, Jiangxi: Xiabu embroidery, also called “xiabu stitch embroidery,” is a form of traditional fine art in which various stitch techniques are used to embroider patterns on ramie-woven cloth. It is relatively concentrated in the ramie-growing areas of Jiangxi Province, with Xinyu City as its representative center. Northern and western Jiangxi produce abundant ramie, and there was once a time when every household grew ramie and wove cloth. Xiabu is a plain-weave or leno-weave cloth hand-woven from ramie. In the traditional division of social labor, women had to master skills such as spinning and weaving, cutting and sewing, and embroidery; xiabu embroidery thus became one of the ways women beautified their lives and gave expression to their feelings. The main processes of xiabu embroidery include treatment steps that soften and heat-press the xiabu cloth, together with the embroidery steps of designing, tracing the draft, mounting on the frame, tightening the frame, matching threads, and embroidering. Xiabu embroidery has a plain, rustic texture with clearly visible warp and weft; its embroidered surfaces use restrained, elegant color schemes and have a strongly tactile quality, and its forms are simple, natural, and lifelike. It is widely used in costume decoration and in festive and wedding occasions. Common stitch techniques include the open-background stitch, void-and-solid stitch, random stitch, cross stitch, spiral stitch, set stitch, and joining stitch. Xiabu embroidery emphasizes line: the role of line is greatly accentuated in the void-and-solid and random stitches, while the role of color is relatively diminished. In the embroidery process, close attention is paid to the rhythm of line between “void” and “solid” — seemingly void yet not void, seemingly solid yet not solid, now hidden and now visible. Xiabu embroidery combines the distinctive texture of xiabu cloth with the flavor of ink-wash painting; its coloring is plain and antique, elegant and deep, its stitch technique flexible and varied, and its tonal quality serene and understated. Xiabu embroidery is transmitted collectively among local women: most began embroidering under the instruction and influence of community members or elder family relatives, and they often gather together to compare skills and hone their techniques. Drawing on the characteristics of the ramie fabric and its distinctive embroidery stitch techniques, xiabu embroidery forms an embroidery language system that embodies the social practice and aesthetic interests of women, giving expression to their feelings and reflections and to their longing and pursuit of a better life. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Soften and heat-treat the ramie": The ramie cloth is softened and heat-set before drafting, mounting, threading and stitching, so that its stiff weave can carry fine needlework. "Through, voided, loose and crossing stitches": Through-stitch leaves the pattern half-sunk in the cloth, while voided, loose and crossing stitches render clouds, foliage and feathers. "Zhang Xiaohong and the Yuzhou workshop": Zhang Xiaohong, a national model worker, founded the Yuzhou workshop, a research institute and a museum, filed five trademarks and forty-six patents, and trained over three hundred embroiderers.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

National representative bearer of Folk Embroidery (grass-cloth embroidery), a fifth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. A number of her works have won the gold prize of the China Arts and Crafts Masterpieces Award, the China Folk Literature and Art Shanhua Award and other honours. She is committed to training talent and has trained more than three hundred embroiderers, creating employment for more than four hundred people.

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 Xiaohong · National Representative Bearer Archive