Ouxiu
01 · Historical Records
Since the 1970s, for a variety of reasons, Ou embroidery has been steadily declining and has reached the point where the art is on the verge of dying out together with its practitioners; rescue and conservation work has therefore become extremely urgent.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Ou embroidery is a traditional folk embroidery art popular in the Wenzhou area of Zhejiang Province. It has a long history and originated in the embroidery practice of women in their boudoirs. Judged from its stitch styles and routines, Ou embroidery developed from the brocade garments of the Tang dynasty. By the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, Wenzhou’s external transport links became increasingly developed, allowing Ou embroidery to absorb the strengths of the sister arts; its technique matured and it developed a style of its own. By the end of the Daoguang reign of the Qing dynasty, Ou embroidery was already very popular in Wenzhou, and among the people a tradition took shape, summed up in the saying “at eleven or twelve a girl combs her hair, at thirteen she is taught to embroider,” together with the custom of giving embroidered gauze skirts as tokens of betrothal between young men and women. At the time, many embroidery shops opened in the city, taking in commissions for embroidered official robes, brocade garments, theatrical costumes, and qipao, and business was brisk. Ou embroidery has a concise composition, brilliant colors, and rigorous stitching, with flexible and ever-changing needle work; its stitch logic is clear and its embroidered surface is lustrous, displaying a regional character all its own, that of the ancient land of Dong’ou. Blending the beauty of poetry, calligraphy and painting, and embroidery, Ou embroidery stresses the unity of stitch technique, brushwork, and the logic of natural forms, demonstrating a high level of craftsmanship and profound traditional cultural depth.
Ink, oil and photographic embroidery
New stitches that bring ink wash, painterly planes and photographic gradation into Ou embroidery, giving the old craft a modern cast.
The two-sided differing-colour work
The first two-sided work with different colours on each face, completed in 2017 and shown in Indiana, marks a structural advance in the craft.
Five Virtues; Gathering Auspicious Signs
Three of his pieces entered the China National Silk Museum in 2008, and Gathering Auspicious Signs was permanently acquired by the West Lake guesthouse after the 2016 G20 summit.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Ou embroidery is popular in the Wenzhou area of Zhejiang and originated in the embroidery practice of women in their boudoirs. By the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, Wenzhou’s external transport links became increasingly developed, allowing Ou embroidery to absorb the strengths of the sister arts, so that its technique matured and it developed a style of its own. By the end of the Daoguang reign of the Qing dynasty, many embroidery shops had opened in Wenzhou, taking in commissions for embroidered official robes, brocade garments, theatrical costumes, and qipao. Since the 1970s Ou embroidery has been steadily declining, and only through rescue efforts in the late twentieth century did new-style stitch techniques re-emerge, including ink-wash embroidery, oil-painting embroidery, photography embroidery, and double-sided two-color embroidery.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
Shi Chengquan (as recorded in the official archive of the associated inheritor): male, of the Han nationality, born in April 1957, a native of Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province. In recent years he has focused on collecting and researching materials and has explored new-style stitch techniques such as ink-wash embroidery, oil-painting embroidery, photography embroidery, and double-sided two-color embroidery, attempting to give Ou embroidery a varied appearance that fuses modern elements. In 2008 three works — “Five Virtues,” “Brocade Feathers Greeting Spring,” and “Five Golden Flowers Welcoming the Olympics” — were acquired by the China National Silk Museum. His work “A Gathering of Auspicious Omens” was exhibited at the Xizi Lake State Guesthouse in Hangzhou during the 2016 G20 Leaders’ Summit and was permanently collected. In 2017 he traveled to Indiana in the United States to demonstrate Ou embroidery technique in person, and in the same year completed “The Mighty Bearing of the Monarch,” the first double-sided, two-color, two-pattern embroidery in the history of Ou embroidery. He attaches importance to the transmission of technique, and works by his students have won a number of awards in many competitions and exhibitions. He is a representative inheritor of Ou embroidery, a national-level intangible cultural heritage item in the fifth national-level batch.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Shi Chengquan 05-2684
- Linshi
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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