Wang Peikun

01 · Lineage & Regional School

Wang Peikun, Male, Han, from Huangshanshitunxi, Anhui, is a fifth-batch national representative bearer of Huizhou Ink Making Craftsmanship (Ⅷ-73). The tradition is documented in Huangshanshitunxi, Anhui. Within the regional tradition and school record of Huizhou Ink Making Craftsmanship in Huangshanshitunxi, Anhui: Huimo is a unique flower among China's ink-making crafts; it has distinctive features, unique techniques, a great variety of schools and types, and rich scientific and technological content, and occupies an important place in the history of Chinese ink-making. According to extant historical records, the production of Huimo (Anhui ink) can be traced back to the late Tang dynasty, and it reached its zenith through the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties. Among the four great ink-making masters of the Qing dynasty, two—Wang Jinsheng and Hu Kaiwen—hailed from Jixi County, and Hu Guobin, the renowned ink-mold woodcarving artisan of the late Qing and early Republican era, was also a native of Shangzhuang in Jixi County. They were representative bearers of the Huimo ink-making craft during the Qing and Republican periods, and their descendants continue to this day to carry forward the essence of the Huimo craft in the local area.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Male, of Han ethnicity, born in April 1950 in Xiuning County, Anhui Province. He is a national representative bearer of Huizhou Ink Making Craftsmanship, a fifth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. He is a senior arts and crafts artist. In 1964 he studied She inkstone carving under Wu Shuiqing, and in 1989 he studied under Hu Liansheng, seventh-generation bearer of Huizhou ink, and Hu Chengjin, a master of ink-mold carving, studying, researching and transmitting Huizhou ink making and ink-mold carving. Since beginning his career, the "illusionary color" gilding technique and the technique of igniting soot with raw lacquer that he has innovatively developed are rarely found in the domestic ink-making industry today. Within the documented technical tradition of Huizhou Ink Making Craftsmanship in Huangshanshitunxi, Anhui: The invention of ink was a major contribution of our ancestors to Chinese culture and indeed to world civilization. Fine Huimo ink made with traditional craftsmanship has many merits: some is 'as hard as jade, with grain like rhinoceros horn, able to write dozens of scrolls without consuming a fraction of an inch'; some is 'fragrant to the very marrow, its scent undiminished even when ground to the last'; some is 'made from pine soot, with chosen fine glue, pounded with pestle force… leaving no residue in the inkstone'; some is 'hard as stone, grained like rhinoceros, black as lacquer, one spiral worth ten thousand coins'; some is 'so lustrous it can be used as a mirror, so sharp it can cut, its virtue comparable to jade, dense and unyielding. The carving workmanship and the ingenuity of its mounting are all perfectly beautiful.' The Huimo ink-making craft is complex; different schools have their own unique secret techniques that are not passed on to outsiders, and even within one school, different production processes are used for different ink-making raw materials. For instance, tung oil, hemp-seed oil, and raw lacquer each have their own distinctive methods of refining, smoke tapping, cooling, collection, and storage; the construction of the pine-soot kiln, the firing, the timing and quantity of pine-branch addition, the smoke collection, glue selection, glue boiling, ingredient mixing, and compounding each have their own secret formulas. Thus produced, Huimo ink is characterized as light to pick up, clean to grind, fragrant to smell, hard as jade, silent when ground, inky as lacquer in a single touch, and able to preserve its true color for millennia. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Feeding soot with lacquer": Zhao Peikun's method of feeding soot with raw lacquer is rare in China; the heat and the fall of ash decide the fineness of the soot. "Iridescent gilding": His iridescent gilding makes colour shift across the surface as the piece is turned, the cleverest flourish in the Tunxi school. "Carving the ink moulds": He trained first in inkstone carving and later with the seventh-generation inheritor and a master mould carver, holding both knife skills at once. "Soot burning and blending": Burning, blending, dosing and forming are each mastered per ink type, with different raw materials calling for different processes even within one school.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

His works Bin Hong Bao Mo (Precious Ink of Bin Hong) and Wangchuan Tu Shi Mo (Poem Ink of the Wangchuan Villa Painting), among others, have won gold awards at national, provincial and ministerial, and industry levels. He actively teaches apprentices and transmits his art, regularly imparting knowledge to Huizhou ink artisans.

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. Wang Peikun · National Representative Bearer Archive