Development of Woodcarving to Promote Cultural Value Added is Key

How to deal with the relationship between traditional manual techniques and modern mechanical means in woodcarvings? How to change the current production of woodcarvings that “make more than culture”? How to strengthen the cultural properties of woodcarvings and enhance their cultural added value in the process of industrialization? These have always been Wood carving industry concerns.

Recently, the "Developing and Leading Chinese Wood Carvings in Innovation" forum organized by the Chinese Society of Arts and Crafts and the professional committee of wood carving arts of the Chinese Arts and Crafts Association was held in Beijing.

The participants held a lively discussion around the theme of “Contemporary Woodcarving Development and Innovation”. Participating experts generally believe that only by properly handling the relationship between traditional cultural heritage and the use of modern technology, strengthening the shaping of wood carving culture, and paying attention to materials, design, and technology, can we better promote the development of the Chinese wood carving industry.

Enhancing cultural added value is the focus of China’s arts and crafts masters and the chairman of the Wood Art Committee of the Chinese Arts and Crafts Association Lu Guangzheng believes that wood sculptures must conform to historical development trends, be good at innovation, have the ability to absorb the nourishment of sister art, and reflect a special ability . At the same time, wood carving practitioners must enrich their own creations, must improve their internal skills, improve their theoretical accomplishments and artistic accomplishments, and create works that are closely related to people's lives and are well-received by the people.

Zhao Meng, the deputy dean of the Fine Arts Academy of Tsinghua University, Gao Zhao, the director of the Sculpture Department of the former China Academy of Fine Arts, and Wang Xiaohui, the sculpture professor of the Fine Arts Academy of Tsinghua University, revealed the development law of wood carving art from the nature of sculpture, painting, and decoration, and proposed that the development of wood carving should be adhered to. Its artistic, ideological and creative. They all agreed that the persistence of the development of "three properties" in wood carving is an important principle for the wood carving industry to maintain its vitality.

Raising the cultural value of wood carving works can effectively nurture the market and avoid flooding the market with crude products. For example, as the tourism market and the collection market continue to heat up, souvenirs for woodcarvings are popular in travel markets and scenic spots around the country, and they are expensive. However, the Chinese arts and crafts master Ruan Dingliang believes that the development and design of wood carving tourist souvenirs have obvious deficiencies, affecting the healthy development of the industry. First of all, there is a single design idea, no local characteristics, very little attention to the connotation of local attractions, and local cultures for design and development; secondly, the production of tourist souvenirs for wood carvings has a low level of production; the production of many tourist handicrafts is severe and the quality is low; and there is a lack of uniform standards. Management and industry grade standards, price positioning accuracy is not enough, not too high or too low.

Lu Dingliang believes that wood carving tourist souvenirs must be designed to break the convention and strengthen individuality, to create art souvenirs with distinctive features and exquisite images, and to have unique creativity, create emotions, and deepen the plot, so that wood carving tourist souvenirs can convey a more profound The morals and tastes.

The combination of manual craftsmanship and mechanical carving is not easy. Wang Jianzhong, sixth generation inheritor of Wangshi Woodcarving in Yangyuan County, Hebei Province, believes that in wood carving craftsmanship, wood carving manual and mechanical carvings should establish quantitative standards to classify the craft inheritance. And promote market segmentation. Wang Jianzhong learned the techniques of carving, chiseling, shoveling, drilling, pushing and planing since childhood. Later, Wang Jianzhong tried to combine traditional techniques with computer engraving to increase efficiency, but the experiment failed. Computers carved patterns were rough and could not be repaired manually. In the past 10 years, Wang's wood carvings have developed more than 80 kinds of relief, openwork and round sculptures on the basis of the traditional style of palace furniture. The hair of the characters in the “Some Maps” created by Wang Jianzhong is less than 0.5 mm thick, and knives can be found in kung fu.

Mechanical carving is difficult to replace manual craftsmanship, making many wood carving companies have a shortage of professional and technical personnel. According to previous media reports, Dongyang woodcarving has encountered this problem. Many small-scale wood carving companies in the locality have used a large number of new skilled workers due to the lack of skilled workers. As a result, the development of antique wood carving furniture companies has been uneven and the quality has not been achieved. Guarantee.

Shen Jihuang, former chief architect of Zhejiang University Architectural Design and Research Institute, sums up the application of modern architecture and wood carving. It should be noted that we should pay attention to the design concept of modern architects, and we must solve the problem of carving density, decentness, etc. , but also pay attention to wood cracking deformation and wood scale issues.

Zhang Yuhai, expert committee member of the China Commodity Trading Market Experts Steering Committee, proposed that wood carving art and crafts should be distinguished from each other, both hands should be involved, and the wood carving industry should be vigorously developed to improve the core competitiveness of wood carving handicrafts.

Wood carving is becoming a hot market Wood carving is a kind of sculpture, and it is a kind of "fine carpentry" type of work that is separated from carpentry. Wood carvings are generally made of fine, tough, hard-to-deform trees, such as Phoebe, red sandalwood, beech, cypress, ginkgo, agarwood, rosewood, longan and other precious woods. Its craftsmanship is skillful and culturally valuable. Quanzhou woodcarvings, Dongyang woodcarvings, Yueqing woodcarvings, and Chaozhou woodcarvings are known as the "four big woodcarvings" in China.

In recent years, the wood carving industry has gradually become an important category of the cultural industry, and it has also become an important choice for the development of cultural industries. According to reports, in 2012, China Woodcarving City in Dongyang City, Zhejiang Province, achieved annual sales of 10.5 billion yuan, and paid taxes of 26.8 million yuan, which indicates that its scale is large. There are more than 30,000 people in the Guangfeng County of Jiangxi Province engaged in the wood carving industry, more than 400 companies, the cumulative annual output value of over 20 billion yuan.

The value of wood carvings has also gradually become known to the public. In June, there were wood sculptures in various auctions. For example, at a large auction in Beijing, seven pieces of boxwood wood carvings were sold at 5, which were higher than the starting price. Among them, the Qing Huang Yang wood carving “Fisher” started with 80,000 yuan and the result was sold for 115,000 yuan. The "unpopular" wood carving artwork also ushered in spring. Insiders pointed out that one of the main reasons for the gradual growth of wood carvings, especially old wood carvings, was the introduction of a ban on auctioning of rhinoceros horn eagles and eagle carvings last year. As a result, many investors and collectors turned to wood carvings and pushed them upwards. The price of wood carvings. According to the Wood Industry Information Network, in recent years, with the limited international protection conventions for valuable timber and mahogany in various countries, the market price for fine wood carvings has been raised at least 10 times, and wood carvings with good looks have now sold at least several thousand. Yuan, some large screens and furniture, even more than 100,000 yuan, hundreds of thousands of dollars in the market price.