Six hundred years ago, Tengchong's ancestors discovered jadeite, and the world's first jadeite processing precedent, as the birthplace of jadeite culture, Tengchong won the honor of "China's first jadeite city".
Jade culture is an important local culture in Tengchong, and it is also a beautiful business card with great characteristics. In order to better spread and carry forward the precious cultural heritage left to us by our ancestors, and also to improve the level of jadeite appreciation, on December 25, Tengchong Jade Museum organized a special lecture on "Jade Appreciation" at Hengyi Gaoligong Castle Hotel, and more than 70 people participated in the relevant leaders of Tengchong Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism, teachers and students of the School of Jewelry of West Yunnan University of Applied Sciences, Tengchong Zhongjian students, and well-known experts and scholars in the jadeite industry. Huang Yongkang, director of the Jade Museum, as the keynote speaker, gave a wonderful lecture on "Jade Culture" through vivid and vivid display of the theme and his own experience.
For hundreds of years, Tengchong ancestors have put forward the most basic and important concepts such as species, bottom, water, color, and flaws in the process of appreciating jade, identifying jade, processing jade, using jade, and studying jade, forming a unique appreciation and evaluation system, which has been widely recognized and used by the jadeite industry to this day. Mr. Huang Yongkang pointed out that the "species, bottom, water, color, and flaws" in the jadeite appreciation system are both independent and interrelated, reflecting the overall condition and characteristics of jadeite.
The species of jadeite refers to its structure and quality, including the maturity of jadeite, which is the most important factor to measure the quality of jadeite. The species of jadeite are divided into "glass species", "ice species", "glutinous species" and "waxy species". Each species is divided into several grades, such as high, medium and low. The division of "species" is qualitative, not quantitative, and cannot be quantitatively divided, and has a certain relativity.
When Tengchong's ancestors summarized and classified the jadeite "species", the jadeite below the glutinous species could not reach the gem level, so it was no longer graded. Now there are many experts and scholars to the jadeite divided into dozens of "species", the level is many and complex, the more people look at the more confused, the so-called road to simplicity, all the truth is simple, complex problems to be simplified, expressed in simple language, and can not be simple things complicated to show their knowledge.
In jadeite appreciation, the "bottom" is also one of the factors that need to be considered. After the jadeite is cut, the "background" of the jadeite color we see is called the "bottom", and the "bottom" is the support of the color and the barrier of the color. The bottom is divided into dozens of types, such as "glass bottom", "ice bottom", "glutinous bottom", "taro bottom", "blue water bottom", "clear water bottom", "porcelain bottom", "white bottom", "rice soup bottom", "egg white bottom", "bean bottom" and so on. Under normal circumstances, the cleaner the base of jadeite, the better, only the foundation of jadeite is pure, warm and beautiful, and its color can be better highlighted. On the contrary, if the foundation is not pure and there are many flaws, the main color of the jadeite will not be highlighted, and the value of the jadeite will be reduced.
"Water" refers to the transparency of jadeite, and the better the water head, the higher the transparency. For jadeite, the better the transparency, the higher its value. Seeds and water are interrelated, and generally speaking, well-planted jade water is definitely good. Conversely, the jadeite species with a strong water head is certainly not bad. The quality of the water head also reflects the advantages and disadvantages of the species from one side.
Another important factor that determines the value of jadeite is "color". Jadeite is very rich in colors, including red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, purple, white, and black. Jadeite is basically available in all the colors of nature, so jadeite is a colorful world that has been sought after by people for hundreds of years. The green color of jadeite is "thick", "yang", "positive", "pretty" and "harmonious", which is an important experience summed up by many generations from the long-term practice of jade.
In jadeite appreciation, "flaws" are an important factor affecting its perfection and value, and "flaws" refer to the "black spots", "cotton", "cracks" and "locks" in jadeite. If it is carefully designed by the jade carver, the flaws in the jadeite are skillfully used to turn decay into magic, and it is entirely possible to achieve extraordinary results.
Mr. Huang Yongkang also said in the lecture that species, bottom, water, color, and flaws are the five major factors related to the material that determine the value of jadeite, but if it is a finished jadeite product, the quality of processing technology is also an important factor in determining its value. To turn jadeite from a rough stone into a work of art, it also requires painstaking and creative labor on the part of a master jade carver.
In the long-term practice of jadeite development, Tengchong's ancestors vividly "compared what it looks like". For example, jadeite species like glass are vividly called "glass species";The bottom of the jadeite is like a green bean, which is called "bean bottom";Because "water" is transparent, the transparency of jadeite is vividly called "water";The color of jadeite is like seedling grass, which is called "seedling green";The impurities in jadeite, such as cotton-like and horsetail-like shapes, are vividly called "cotton" and "locks". This is the "image jadeite" left to us by our ancestors, which is the crystallization of the wisdom of many generations, and is not the original creation of one person.
The relevant knowledge of jadeite appreciation is the crystallization of collective wisdom summed up by several generations, and is the precious historical and cultural heritage left by Tengchong's ancestors, which is not only a culture, but also an art, which not only carries Tengchong's profound cultural heritage, but also contains a unique feeling of the people on the edge of jadeite. In this lecture, Mr. Huang Yongkang gave a professional explanation of jadeite appreciation, which was wonderful and easy to understand, bringing a feast of knowledge of jadeite culture to the audience. In the future, Tengchong Jade Museum will also organize various forms of jadeite special lectures and cultural exchange activities to better help the inheritance and development of Tengchong jadeite history and culture.
*: Hang Yick Group.