Elephant News reporter Zhao Chaoyang Xu Zhaopeng , *
Pushing the door of Li Yunqin's house, what catches your eye is a wall full of antique real grass seal "dragon" wallpaper decoration.
It is her home, her studio and classroom.
Approaching the Spring Festival of the Year of the Dragon, a group of her "little apprentices" came running over, clamoring to learn how to brand dragons. As the inheritor of the intangible cultural heritage of Zhengzhou Zhongyuan District and the master of folk crafts in Henan Province, Li Yunqin, who could not resist the children, "personally taught" the essence of her brand painting on the spot.
Branding is about the pen
58-year-old Li Yunqin worked in Nanyang City, Henan Province, in his early years. She joined the factory in 1985, when she was only 19 years old.
At that time, it was called a branding factory, not a branding painting. * Take out a few pairs of chopsticks and a wooden ruler that have been treasured for many years, and show that although the history of branding in China can be traced back to the Qin and Han dynasties, the real popularity and prosperity were still in the Ming and Qing dynasties. In the early days, it was called "branded flowers" because the paintings were relatively small, mainly used for the decoration of chopsticks, rulers, fan bones, and comb grates.
The earliest soldering paintings, also known as 'fire brush paintings', were made with an overheated soldering iron and burned on paper, silk cloth, and wooden boards. Compared with the pen and ink Danqing, the difficulty of branding is that 'the intention is the pen first, and the next stroke is completed', and there is no room for change. Li Yunqin said that this requires that the painter must have a certain foundation in art and calligraphy. And writing and painting are precisely her natural favorites.
Li Yunqin's career is catching up with the era of reform and opening up in full swing. With the advancement of electric soldering iron and other technologies, "branding" conforms to the times, stands out in the pursuit of consumers in the market, and naturally transitions into a unique "branding" art. Not only at home, but also abroad, it has caused a great sensation.
Once upon a time, the ** era
Li Yunqin said that when she first started working, Nanyang Branding Painting Factory also began to reform, in addition to the relatively simple traditional branding, specially selected young employees with a strong art foundation, and set up a technical team, intending to make a breakthrough in large-scale single works, Li Yunqin is also among them.
The traditional techniques are mainly in Chinese painting, and the techniques of outlining dot dyeing and white drawing are the most basic. Li Yunqin said that in the first ten years of the last century, once their branding works were exhibited, they would always cause a strong response from the market, "One year we painted at the Japanese exhibition site, and they didn't think that the soldering iron could also be used as a pen. ”
In China, as a high-end handicraft, the large-format branding works at that time were also widely favored by the public, and even a bit of "radish is fast and does not wash mud".
1998 and 1999 were Li Yunqin's busiest two years. She not only opened a store in Zhengzhou Antique City, but also participated in the performance of the Zhengzhou International Shaolin Martial Arts Festival on behalf of the factory.
During that time, I was running at both ends of Zhengzhou and Nanyang, and I was busy on both sides for half a month. Li Yunqin said that it was also the ** era of branding. In addition to the large works, the most popular among ordinary people on the market are small zodiac works.
This is the cultural gene engraved in the bones of the Chinese. Li Yunqin said that the most difficult thing to brand is the dragon. "The dragon is a vague combination of the ancients' images of fish, crocodiles, snakes, cows, horses and other animals, as well as natural celestial phenomena such as wind, thunder, clouds and electricity, and is the only most magical one among the zodiac animals. ”
The combination of Chinese and Western is well understood
Later, Li Yunqin settled in the Central Plains District of Zhengzhou and opened his own studio. This also allows her to calm down and concentrate on studying and innovating new techniques of branding. "The common people are no longer satisfied with the line composition of the white drawing, and have a higher level of requirements for the texture and beauty of the branding painting. ”
Every year when the Lunar New Year is approaching, Li Yunqin prepares in advance, and this year is no exception.
On the day of the interview, ** took out a pair of semi-finished products on the spot and demonstrated the dragon whiskers, dragon scales, and cloud scaling skills for the reporter. "The flank movement of Chinese painting and the pause of calligraphy can depict the relationship between fiction and reality. The sketch of Western painting can express the perspective relationship between distance and near. There are also light and shade and tonal techniques of oil painting, as well as the texture expression of printmaking, engraving, and photography, which can be moved to the painting. ”
With Li Yunqin's explanation and movements, a dragon with round eyes, flying scales and claws, and soaring clouds and fog became more and more vivid on the wooden board.
Theory combined with practice, tradition combined with modern, Chinese style combined with Western, and the integration has created an increasingly prominent three-dimensional sense of brand painting, which makes Li Yunqin's brand painting style not only have the freehand atmosphere of traditional Chinese style, but also have the rigorous and delicate Western style. In 2008, Li Yunqin's work won the Special Honor Award at the Asian Arts Festival. In 2012, her silk painting was selected as one of the first batch of special tourism products in Zhengzhou.
The reporter also saw her treasured 20-meter silk scroll "Qingming Riverside Picture" at home, Li Yunqin said that she created many such scrolls before and after, and each work took nearly 3 years.
"Art has always transcended tradition".
As the saying goes, "if you want to do a good job, you must first sharpen your tools", Li Yunqin fiddled with the motor knob connected to the soldering iron while painting.
She said that she started out painting on basswood boards, and that the heat gathering of the soldering iron was done with an electric furnace wire. Not only was the work limited by the wood grain, but the soldering iron often burned the fingers. Later, innovations in materials and technology began, with plywood and plywood replacing basswood boards, and the craftsmanship of rice paper and silk was improved. The single-control electric furnace wire of the soldering iron has gradually evolved into a special equipment that can control the temperature, "Even the soldering iron pen barrel that used to be stunned has become curved, so that the heat and strength are easier to grasp." It not only saves costs, but also improves efficiency, and strengthens the texture of the work. ”
Not only have improvements been made in the substrate, techniques, and equipment, but Li Yunqin's works have also kept pace with the times and made bold innovations in terms of content. In addition to the traditional masterpieces of "Twelve Golden Hairpins", "Ladies and Gentlemen", "Fuchun Mountain Residence" and "Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival", Li Yunqin closely follows the pulse of the times, and has also created many realistic works in recent years, which have won many awards.
This year is the Year of the Dragon, and I am collecting some materials to take my students to create a Chinese dragon that embodies Chinese modernization. In her words, times are constantly changing, and artistic expressions are always transcending tradition.
*: Elephant News).