Zhuxianzhen Woodblock New Year Pictures
01 · Historical Records
According to the Dongjing Meng Hua Lu (Dreams of Splendor of the Eastern Capital), Zhuxian Town, more than twenty kilometers south of Kaifeng city, already had woodblock New Year prints in the Northern Song dynasty. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, the woodblock New Year prints of Zhuxian Town were extremely prosperous, with workshops numbering more than three hundred at their peak. In the late Qing and early Republican period, Zhuxian Town woodblock New Year prints began to decline, and most workshops moved back into the city of Kaifeng, which thus once again became the center of production and sale of Zhuxian Town woodblock New Year prints; within the city appeared the celebrated time-honored New Year print workshops "Tiancheng", "Yunji", and "Huichuan". After 1949, Kaifeng City successively established such organizations as the Kaifeng New Year Print Society and the Henan Zhuxian Town Woodblock New Year Print Society to excavate and organize the traditional craft of woodblock New Year prints. The subjects of the prints are mostly drawn from popular folk tales, myths and legends, and traditional opera; they are numerous and varied, with vivid images.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Kaifeng City, Henan Province, lies on the eastern Henan plain. Zhuxian Town woodblock New Year prints are meticulous in their use of color: mineral and plant materials serve as the basis for pigments, which the artisans grind by hand themselves. The pigments thus ground are remarkably pure, and the prints made with them are bright and vivid and do not fade over time; the compositions are full and well balanced, the lines succinct and bold, and the forms plain and exaggerated — a unique artistic style.
The Zhuxianzhen prints recorded in the Dongjing Menghua Lu
The Dongjing Menghua Lu records woodblock prints at Zhuxianzhen, some twenty kilometres south of Kaifeng, as early as the Northern Song; in Ming and Qing times the trade peaked at more than three hundred workshops.
Hand-ground mineral and vegetable pigments
Colour is taken seriously: pigments are hand-ground from minerals and plants to great purity, giving bright prints that do not fade, but the traditional grinding method is now little known.
The old shops Tiancheng, Yunji and Huichuan
As workshops moved back into Kaifeng city around 1900, the shops Tiancheng, Yunji and Huichuan became famous; Guo Taiyun was apprenticed at Yunji at thirteen and opened his own Taisheng shop after three years.
Ren Helin and the revived stencil printing method
Ren Helin helped prepare the Kaifeng press in 1978 and joined it in 1984; he recovered the lost stencil printing technique in 2010, founded the Kaifeng woodblock print museum in 2007 and led the Henan University institute in 2014.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Zhuxian Town woodblock New Year prints are produced and sold mainly at Zhuxian Town south of Kaifeng city and at the time-honored print workshops within Kaifeng.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
Kaifeng has so far excavated and organized more than 220 old New Year print blocks, reprinted more than 300 sets of historical old-edition New Year prints, and compiled and published "Selected Kaifeng Zhuxian Town Woodblock New Year Prints", "Collector's Edition of Zhuxian Town Woodblock New Year Prints", "Stories of Zhuxian Town Woodblock New Year Prints", and other volumes, doing much valuable work for the protection of traditional woodblock New Year prints. However, at present most of the elderly artisans are advanced in years, and their skills have no successors; the traditional methods of grinding mineral and plant pigments in particular are now known to few. If protection is not undertaken in time, the craft of Zhuxian Town woodblock New Year print production may well disappear entirely. Guo Taiyun (record from the official file of the associated inheritor): Male, of Han ethnicity, born in 1926, a native of Kaifeng, Henan. At the age of thirteen, he became an apprentice at the "Yunji" door-god shop in Kaifeng; after three years he completed his apprenticeship and opened a shop of his own, under the name "Taisheng". In the 1960s, he carved and printed large numbers of new New Year prints reflecting real life; in the late 1970s, when Kaifeng established the Zhuxian Town New Year Print Society, he served as deputy director of its research office for old-edition prints. With his superb woodblock New Year print coloring and production skills, he rescued, collected, and organized traditional folk arts that were on the verge of extinction. Guo Taiyun has made woodblock New Year prints for seventy years; the prints he produces are expressive and neat, with gorgeous color combinations that do not lose their dignity, and carry a strong rustic flavor. He is a witness to the rise and fall of Zhuxian Town New Year prints in Kaifeng, and has been engaged by the Kaifeng City Museum as an advisor on New Year prints. He has held special exhibitions and demonstrations in Singapore and the United States; many of his works are collected by the National Art Museum of China and the Capital Museum. Representative inheritor of Zhuxian Town woodblock New Year prints, a national-level intangible cultural heritage item of the first batch. Ren Helin (record from the official file of the associated inheritor): Male, of Han ethnicity, born in August 1949, a native of Lankao County, Henan Province. He has loved art since childhood, and in 1965 was admitted to the printmaking major of the fine arts department of Henan University. In 1970, he took up a post at the Lankao County Cultural Center. In 1973, he began creating prints. In 1978, he took part in the preparations for the Kaifeng Zhuxian Town New Year Print (Publishing) Society. In 1984, he entered the society, successively serving as art editor, director of the editorial department, and deputy director. In 2010, he successfully revived the lost louban (screen-printing) technique. In 2014, he took the lead in establishing the Henan University Kaifeng Woodblock New Year Print Research Institute. For more than thirty years, he has collected more than a thousand woodblock New Year print items (sheets) from Shanghai, Beijing, and elsewhere, and has reproduced all of them. Attaching importance to the transmission of woodblock New Year print craft, he established the Kaifeng Ren Helin Woodblock New Year Print Studio in 1995. In 2007, he founded the Kaifeng Woodblock New Year Print Museum (Kaifeng Zhuxian Town New Year Print Art Museum). Representative inheritor of Zhuxian Town woodblock New Year prints, a national-level intangible cultural heritage item of the fifth batch.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Guo Taiyun 01-0055
- Ren Helin 05-2575
- Zhang Tingxu
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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