Furniture Making Craftsmanship
01 · Historical Records
Fine woodworking was a craft that only took its definitive form after large quantities of hard precious timber were imported in the Ming dynasty: once the material changed, woodworking in Jiangnan turned from coarse wooden furniture toward refined and intricate carving and structural design. By the end of the Qing dynasty, with the large-scale use of hardwoods such as Indochina rosewood (Dalbergia cochinchinensis), which came to be known as redwood (hongmu), the craft gradually came to be popularly renamed the redwood craft, and this name has been used ever since.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Cities in Jiangsu Province such as Nanjing, Nantong, Changzhou, Suzhou and Changshu, together with the surrounding countryside, have been gathering literati and producing skilled craftsmen since ancient times; their unique human and geographical advantages have fostered a deep and solid tradition of folk woodworking. Beginning in the Ming dynasty, large quantities of hard precious timber (mainly of the redwood family) were imported and put to use. With the active participation of numerous Jiangnan literati and the strong promotion of the imperial court, the level of folk woodworking across Jiangsu rose dramatically while gradually developing toward refinement and detail, giving shape to a special craft applied specifically to hardwood carving and wooden wares — the traditional fine woodworking craft. By the end of the Qing dynasty, because of the large-scale use of imported hardwoods such as Indochina rosewood, which came to be known as redwood, this craft gradually came to be habitually called the redwood craft among the people, and the name has continued to the present. Fine woodworking requires artisans to possess special skills far beyond those of ordinary carpenters and carvers, chiefly in the following respects: a deep understanding of the grain and character of every piece of hardwood used, and a practiced ability to work according to the material, so as to maximize the added value of precious redwood resources; the ability to complete, by keen hand-feel on hardwood (mainly of the redwood family), highly difficult wooden artworks that cannot be quantified by drawings; and the ability, with the help of specially made tools, to execute entirely by hand very complex combinations of traditional mortise-and-tenon (sunmao) joinery and exquisite artistic forms.
Reading the timber
The maker must first read the nature of each piece of hardwood and then work to it, squeezing the most value out of scarce timber.
Joining by traditional mortise and tenon
Complex mortise-and-tenon assemblies are cut by hand with special tools, judged by feel rather than by any drawing.
Integrating carved edge mouldings
Carving the edge moulding and the decoration as one piece is a high-difficulty skill worked out by Yang Jinrong while the wood is still workable.
Tensioning cane webbing
Cane webbing is woven under tension for seats and backs; Yang Jinrong brought it back, one of the few techniques recovered by reading old furniture.
Carving and finishing
After carving, repeated polishing is what brings out the warmth of the wood until the surface reflects a figure.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
In terms of schools, Jiangsu fine woodworking is marked not by region but by lineage of instruction: the line of Tang Rongpei and Wang Jinsheng passed on to Yang Jinrong their hand-feel and understanding of material, and the latter in turn developed nameable techniques, such as the integrated face-edge and batten construction and the matched-timber irregular ice-crack lattice with cambered tread. The rattan-binding technique, once common on Qing-dynasty furniture, had been lost for a time and was researched and recovered by Yang Jinrong; the Maoshan Redwood Art Museum, completed in 2017, displays more than four hundred fine pieces in concentrated form and has become the most concentrated physical reference point for this craft in the present age.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Ming-style Furniture Making Craftsmanship · Furniture Making Craftsmanship · Furniture Making Craftsmanship · Furniture Making Craftsmanship · Furniture Making Craftsmanship · Furniture Making Craftsmanship.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
In the 1990s the Jiangsu Arts and Crafts Industry Association founded the Jiangsu Gongmei Redwood Culture and Art Research Institute, which has done considerable work in protecting this craft; however, such work is still far from enough, and it is necessary to mobilize the strength of society as a whole on a broader scale to make protection better. Yang Jinrong (from the official archive of the associated inheritor): male, of Han ethnicity, born in February 1950, a native of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. He is a representative inheritor of the Furniture Making Craft (Fine Woodworking Craft), an item of the fourth national-level batch of intangible cultural heritage. He is a senior arts and crafts artist. In his youth he studied forging for eight years; in 1980 he was admitted to the Jiangsu Foreign Trade School, and because he engaged in the export of redwood products he devoted himself to studying and researching the fine woodworking craft. He studied under veteran master carpenters such as Tang Rongpei and Wang Jinsheng, gradually developing his own technical characteristics; he created highly difficult hand techniques such as the integrated face-edge and batten construction and the matched-timber irregular ice-crack lattice with cambered tread, and through research recovered the rattan-binding technique. He led the drafting of China's first local standard for the quality of redwood products (DB32/T368-2000) and published the monograph Discussions on Redwood Culture. He is currently director of the Jiangsu Arts and Crafts Redwood Culture and Art Research Institute. The Maoshan Redwood Art Museum, founded under his leadership, was completed in 2017 and displays in concentrated form more than four hundred fine pieces by the project's representative inheritors, including himself.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Xu Jianping 03-1318
- Zhongguiyou 03-1319
- Yang Xia 03-1320
- Cao Yunjian 04-1846
- Yang Jinrong 04-1847
- Huang Fuhua 05-2757
- Wang Zhaoqi
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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