Sun Yanling

01 · Lineage & Regional School

Sun Yanling, Female, Manchu, from Mudanjiang, Heilongjiang, is a fifth-batch national representative bearer of Manchu Embroidery (Ⅶ-80). The tradition is documented in Mudanjiang, Heilongjiang. Within the regional tradition and school record of Manchu Embroidery in Mudanjiang, Heilongjiang: The subjects are drawn from the area's distinctive local customs and natural scenery, reflecting the folkways and traditions of the Manchu people. The origins and development of this project are a vivid practice of cultural exchange and integration among multiple ethnic groups, reflecting the unity and inclusiveness of Chinese civilization, and are of positive significance for promoting ethnic unity and harmony.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Female, of the Manchu ethnic group, born in March 1978 in Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province. From 1984 she studied Manchu embroidery with her maternal grandmother, née Zhang, and her mother Yu Xiuying. In 2007 she opened the Yanjie Embroidery Studio and founded the Bohai Mohe Embroidery brand, developing a series of products that includes embroidered garments, still-life pictures, landscape pictures and decorative hangings. In 2010 she established a production and processing base in Rason, Korea, and her products are exported to Japan, the Republic of Korea, Russia, the United States and other countries. She founded a vocational training school for Manchu embroidery, which transmits the craft while helping local women to find employment and start businesses. Within the documented technical tradition of Manchu Embroidery in Mudanjiang, Heilongjiang: Mudanjiang Manchu Embroidery is a form of embroidery created by the Sumo Mohe people, ancestors of the Manchu, during the Bohai State (Balhae) of the Sui and Tang periods, in the area of present-day Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province. Using locally produced tussah silk, they studied and absorbed the finest techniques of Central Plains embroidery and combined them with their own ethnic characteristics. Relevant excavated artifacts and murals confirm that Bohai Mohe embroidery was already quite mature at that time. The project uses tussah silk thread, particular to Northeast China, as its embroidery material; the tussah is a wild silkworm whose silk has a jewel-like luster, natural and soft. Mudanjiang enjoys exceptionally favorable geographical conditions, with abundant oak forest resources that supply ample, high-quality raw material for the project. Mudanjiang Manchu Embroidery is renowned for its lifelike, three-dimensional visual effect: it conveys the refraction of light and shadow, making viewers feel as if they were present in the scene. Highly prized for appreciation, it is praised as "the oil painting of embroidery." The traditional stitch is the chicken-claw stitch, handed down from the Bohai State period; its shape resembles a chicken's claw. Through generations of transmission, the stitch technique has kept developing; today the triangle stitch is generally used, with fairly large stitches, worked from large to small in 4 to 8 overlapping layers, the silk threads doubled and the colors blended, so that the forms resemble five-pointed stars. The resulting artworks are fine and exquisite, richly colored, and true to life in their scenery—at once delicate and gentle, and bold and unrestrained. Historically, Manchu women mostly acquired the craft through heart-to-heart, hand-to-hand transmission from elder women of the family. With richly colored and textured embroidered works, Manchu women adorned their lives and delighted their hearts, adding an artistic atmosphere to everyday life; the craft has aesthetic value. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Chicken-claw stitch": The traditional stitch handed down from the Bohai period, named for its chicken-claw-shaped stitches. "Triangle stitch and four to eight layers": The stitch now in common use: large stitches tapering smaller over four to eight layers to produce a five-pointed star shape and effects of light. "Tussah silk and oak forest": The work uses the wild tussah silk of northeast China with its jewel-like lustre, plentiful in the oak forests around Mudanjiang. "Embroidery's oil painting": Its realistic, three-dimensional light effects have earned it the name of embroidery's oil painting.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

She is a representative bearer of Manchu embroidery, a fifth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. She is the fourth-generation bearer of Manchu embroidery and a deputy to the Thirteenth National People's Congress. Her embroideries have been exhibited and honoured at numerous intangible cultural heritage exhibitions and expos.

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. Sun Yanling · National Representative Bearer Archive