Text/Yangcheng Evening News All-Media Reporter Lu Nanfang Photo/Yangcheng Evening News All-Media Reporter Deng Bo
In the late Qing Dynasty, Cixi overthrew the Summer Palace and recruited skilled craftsmen across the country. Li Wenyuan, a craftsman from Shawan Town, Panyu, Guangzhou, came to Beijing to take the exam, but he did not expect to win the top murals in one fell swoop. From then on, he worked in the inner court to wait for the orders of the emperor.
In 2016, He Shiliang, a villager and brick carving artist of Li Wenyuan, won the highest award in Chinese folk art – the Mountain Flower Award with his craftsmanship that was as skilled as his predecessors. In July 2022, the Central General Library of the National Edition Museum, known as the “Chinese Cultural Seed Gene Bank”, was unveiled, and He Shiliang’s works were also written.
From Li Wenyuan to He Shiliang, Lingnan architectural culture has gone from being partial to entering the hall, and has been passed down from generation to generation and has a continuous cultural heritage. Tracing their common origin, Shawan, Panyu, is an ancient cultural town with a long history in Lingnan. The surnames Li and He are both big surnames in Shawan Town. Most of their ancestors were officials and nobles, and they moved here one after another to avoid military chaos in the late Southern Song Dynasty. Because of his wealth, Shawan people built civil engineering and valued culture and education. To this day, the town has engraved the marks of history and civilization everywhere, and the legend of hiding dragons and lying tigers is even more talked about.
He Shiliang
He Shiliang is 52 years old this year, and is born, grown up and life in Shawan. Walking on the old street of the ancient town, the old man under the banyan tree greeted him warmly – “Master He”, but he looked shy and never said a few words of scenes. Although he has long been a celebrity in Shawan, he never regards himself as a “master”. In his opinion, he was just Cinema because he was immersed in the “Ancient Style and Ancient Rain” of Shawan since he was a child, and it was due to his fate to make a connection with ancient buildings. Starting from a Cinema brick, He Shiliang was addicted to carving beams and paintings of the roads and building Lingnan. People may not believe it when they say it. As the first traditional architectural craftsman in Guangdong and the “brick carving craftsman” in the country, he learned brick carving skills almost entirely by himself. Like many folk art geniuses, he has a low education and can learn without a teacher. In the past decade, the general idea of intangible cultural heritage has been deeply rooted in people’s hearts. As a inheritor, He Shiliang has promoted many of his talents.m/”>Komiks devoted himself to “passing and helping”. He hoped to work with his apprentices to work hard to bring brick carving from the scenic spot exhibition hall into ordinary life, and from the ancient Lingnan city to a broader world stage.
In 2015, He Shiliang (third from left) created the stage brick carved wall “The Six Kingdoms’ Great Famous Prime Minister” for the Guangdong Cantonese Opera Museum, and won the China Folk Literature and Art Mountain Flower Award. Strange Man: From an apprentice in the furniture factory to a famous brick carving craftsman, Shawan Ancient Town has a history of more than 800 years. It still preserves many “living specimens” of Lingnan traditional culture, including Guangdong music, floating colorBabaylan, fish lanterns, ancient ancestral halls, etc., which makes Shawan a veritable national-level folk art town.
Scrape out various types of people with a knife on a blue brick. href=”https://funnybookish.com/”>Babaylan pattern was just a kind of entertainment to pass the time for He Shiliang when he was a child. The place where He Shiliang was born, there were brick carvings left in the old houses and ancestral halls. It was just ordinary at that time. He Shiliang did not wish to use this as a career in the face of these “carving tricks”. In comparison, he loved painting more.
It was not until after graduating from junior high school that he entered a furniture factory as an apprentice. He was fascinated by the wood carving techniques of his master and master, so that he didn’t sleep in the middle of the night and secretly took out white paper to copy their design drawings. When his master in his seventies discovered it, he not only did not blame him, but instead developed a love for talent. He taught He Shiliang to carve and draw, just like he regarded him as his successor.
Master Hu Zhi was originally Lingnan woodKomiks The master of the carving factory continued to engage in wood carving design after retirement. He was a “big name” in the Cantonese furniture wood carving industry in the 1990s. Master Hu Minqiang was the son of his master. He received the true teachings of his master and had a profound attainment in furniture wood carving. The experience of learning wood carving with his master and his master changed the fate of He Shiliang’s life.
19 In 1996, he had the opportunity to participate in the reconstruction of Baomo Garden in Panyu and undertake the task of wood carving. The project commander at that time wanted to make a large brick carving screen wall. He took a fancy to He Shiliang’s carving skills and forced him to transform from wood carving to brick carving. You must know that He Shiliang had never touched brick carving at this time. With the spirit of a newborn calf not afraid of tigers, He Shiliang spent three years to complete the 22.35-meter-long and 5.83-meter-high artistic brick carving “Tu Yan He Ming Wall”. This brick carving work integratesTechniques such as round carving, openwork, relief and line carving are magnificent overall. The meticulous craftsmanship breaks through the traditional expression techniques, set a precedent for the display of single brick carving artworks, and were selected as the best record in the Shanghai world’s Guinness World at that time.
For a time, He Shiliang became famous. He Shiliang is proficient in the three “literary” decorations of traditional Chinese architecture, wood carving, brick carving and stone carving. In 20CinemaIn 2001, he founded the Arts and Crafts Studio with brick carving as the theme. To outsiders, this is a thankless choice. With He Shiliang’s craftsmanship and fame, if he opens a wood carving furniture factory, he can get rich quickly. But what He Shiliang thought was that Lingnan brick carvings were on the verge of being lost, and he must carry forward this traditional and exquisite craftsmanship again.
He Shiliang (right)’s studio in Shawan Town
Witness: From Lingnan brick carving to Lingnan architecture
The history of Lingnan brick carving can be traced back to the Western Han Dynasty and the Nanyue Kingdom. A brick walkway was unearthed in the ruins of the palace of the Royal Palace Garden of the Western Han Dynasty, 4th Road, Zhongshan Road, Guangzhou, which was excavated in the 1990s. The brick surface was engraved with geometric patterns and small seal characters. Some brick carvings painted in vermilion or green and brick carved window lattices were also discovered one after another. By the Ming and Qing dynasties, brick carvings were widely used in ancestral halls, temples and houses in Lingnan, forming a unique style.
However, BabaylanHe Shiliang’s love for brick carving art is not just because it is an “antique”. On the contrary, he likes the atmosphere of life emitted by Lingnan brick carvings, which are daily, friendly and full of vitality. “Lingnan brick carvings are different from brick carvings in other places, and have a very unique charm. If the northern brick carvings are bold and the Jiangnan brick carvings are elegant, the Lingnan brick carvings are exquisite in the roughness, and they are more civilian and ignited in the selection of subject matter.”
In the brick carvings created by He Shiliang, Lingnan scenery such as lychees, banana leaves, Buddha’s hands, red cotton, lotus flowers are common elements, and the characteristics of South Guangdong are vividly displayed. These objectsKomiks also has a deeper meaning. For example, lychee is homophonic to pronounce “Laizi” in Cantonese, and Buddha’s hand is homophonic to pronounce “Fu Shou” in Cantonese. This is the Lingnan cultural code hidden in brick carvings, and only locals can understand it.
The Lingnan scenery in He Shiliang’s brick carving works is a part of “Hundred Bats and Spring” in Yuehui Garden, Dongguan
Precisely because of the unique folk atmosphere of Lingnan brick carvings, the brick carving art in He Shiliang’s ideal is not an exhibit placed in a museum or scenic spot, but an art that is truly integrated into the architectural pattern of Lingnan, and is both functional and decorative.
“The characteristics of Lingnan brick carvings in each era are different, but their development and the development of Lingnan architecture are moving forward in parallel. For example, Liugeng Hall in Shawan Town is a typical ancient Qing Dynasty building. It uses brick carvings and brackets to replace the wooden components of the past. It has stronger functionalities and more simple and extensive styles. But when you go to the Chen Family Ancestral Hall, you will find that the characteristics and uses of brick carvings are completely different, the techniques are more complex, the subject matter is richer, and the decorativeness overshadows the functionality.” He Shiliang was very excited when talking about the combination of Lingnan brick carvings and Lingnan ancient buildings. However, the “History of Weishui” of brick carvings is coming to an end in modern times. Later, the popular architectural types of arcades and small villas in Guangzhou gradually replaced traditional buildings, and brick carvings were difficult to find a place to use in construction projects.
Until recent years, Lingnan brick carvings have attracted more and more attention as an intangible cultural heritage, and He Shiliang was able to participate in the collective creation of some urban landmark buildings. In 2015, He Shiliang created the opera Babaylan‘s platform brick carving wall “The Great Seal of the Six Kingdoms” for the Guangdong Cantonese Opera Museum. His work restores the lively scenes and rich character shapes in the same title, and fully demonstrates the traditional Lingnan brick carving craftsmanship and won the 12th China Folk Literature and Art Mountain Flower Award Art Works Award.
From brick carving as the starting point, He Shiliang spent a lot of effort to study the ancient buildings of LingnanKomiks, and was committed to exploring and inheriting the architectural culture of Lingnan from all aspects. He did not stop working as a “driller”, and he has achieved great achievements in building space design, component building, decoration and decoration – 2022He made 200 Manchurian flower windows with Lingnan characteristics for Wenhan Pavilion, the Central General Pavilion of the National Edition Pavilion, and customized two VIP rooms with Lingnan culture for the Guangzhou branch. “I cherish such job opportunities, so that more people can feel the charm of Lingnan architecture without going to the Chen Family Ancestral Hall or Liugeng Hall. I hope that our contemporary urban landmark buildings can have more quality projects that integrate traditional architectural culture, spirit and skills, and lead our contemporary architectural design to a higher and richer artistic level.”
He Shiliang made Manchurian Flower Window for the Central General Pavilion of the National Edition Pavilion
Qizhi: From the national to the world
In 2008, Lingnan brick carvings were listed as Guangdong’s provincial intangible cultural heritage. He Shiliang was in a complicated mood at the beginning of the identity of the inheritor of intangible cultural heritage. He was worried that the positioning of intangible cultural heritage means announcing that brick carvings are inevitably turning into “antiques”, which is what he least wants to face.
So, using the studio as a base, He Shiliang began to recruit apprentices everywhere. In order to support himself and his apprentices, He Shiliang opened a factory to undertake some commercial projects of brick carving and wood carving to “transfusion” for him in inheriting the Lingnan brick carving craft.
Ding Junyun has been learning carving from scratch with He Shiliang since 2004, and has participated in the carving of “Hundred Bats and Spring” in Yuehui Garden in Dongguan. “Hundred Bats and Spring” is another masterpiece of screen wall brick carving created by He Shiliang after “Tu Yan and Ming Wall”. It is about 50 meters long and 9 meters high. It took nearly three years from design, production, installation to completion. Ding Junyun recalled that in those three years, he went out early and returned late with his master almost every day, accompanied by the harsh sound of electric drills, dull carvings, and the dust that thrusts towards them.
In the view of Ding Junyun, who was less than 20 years old at the time, brick carving was a hard and boring job. He chose to follow He Shiliang as an apprentice just to make a living. Until the entire work was completed, Ding Junyun was deeply shocked. He took photos of his work to his hometown in rural Guangxi. No one believed that it was his masterpiece.
“I didn’t have the confidence to learn brick carving at the beginning. It was the master who encouraged me to be patient. Cinema I wanted to read and think more. Gradually, I fell in love with this art and hoped to make more peopleUnderstand brick carving. “Ding Junyun is now the most enthusiastic among all He Shiliang’s apprentices who participate in public publicity. He often goes to schools and communities to display and explain brick carving skills. In 2018, he was named the district-level intangible cultural heritage inheritor of the Guangzhou brick carving project.
Work environment for brick carving productionKomiks is very hard
He Shiliang often advises his disciples to read more books and watch more exhibitions. He hopes that his disciples will not only position himself as a traditional architectural craftsman, but also study brick carving as an art. He wants to change people’s stereotypes about intangible cultural heritage – not blindly pursue retro and conservative, but to creatively develop traditional art and truly build people’s confidence and pride in their aesthetic traditions.
In He Shiliang’s view, aesthetics are more important than techniques. A brick becomes a brick carving artwork, and it has to go through multiple processes such as drafting, roughing, fixing, polishing, and installation. Not only href=”https://funnybookish.com/”>Cinema requires craftsmen to have a foundation in painting design and have a precise grasp of three-dimensional depth. In addition, the creation of traditional brick carving themes requires a very solid knowledge reserve for local culture, folk history, ancient novels and operas. In order to “make up lessons”, He Shiliang once collected books on Lingnan literature and history. Because brick carving likes to use flowers, birds and beasts, he repeatedly studied “Hundred Birds”, “Hundred Beasts”, and “Hundred Flowers”. He even studied photography by his disciples, spending a long time visiting ancient buildings in various parts of the Pearl River Delta every year. After returning home, he washed out the photos and used a magnifying glass to study them one by one in order to learn from others’ strengths.
He Shiliang has a tenacity in his brick carving factory. He has to learn everything to the extreme. Although he often doesn’t make a sound, what he makes is always unexpected and extraordinary. “Yangcheng Evening NewsBabaylan reporter Deng Bo and He Shiliang met in an interview more than 20 years ago. His first impression of He Shiliang was that he was “very poor in eloquence”. After getting familiar with him, Deng Bo realized that the shining points of He Shiliang was a kind of humility that was not easy to see in artistic geniuses.
Archivist Wang Enhan also met He Shiliang because of interviews. He visited famous brick carving masters across the country, but like He ShiliangThere are almost very few who can surpass their predecessors in craftsmanship and techniques, and at the same time, they can grasp the grand themes to create. “The magic of folk art lies in the artist himself. Many of his achievements are created by his personal talent. This is difficult to replicate, and it also leads to the extinction of folk art.” However, He Shiliang himself is not so pessimistic. Despite the bleak benefits, he has been operating his studio and factory diligently for decades. In 2020, he also built the He Shiliang Art Museum in the central square of Shawan Ancient Town, which displays more than 50 brick and wood carvings, all of which are his ingenious work. In 2021, the screen wall brick carving “Ancient Rhymes and Tengfang·Present Times” he created for Shawan Town was born and became another new architectural landmark in the ancient town. “Does tradition have to be behind the times? I never think so. There is a saying that goes, the more national it is, the more world it is. Lingnan architecture is full of treasures, and it should be seen by more people.”
In 2021, He Shiliang created a large-scale screen wall brick carving “Ancient Rhymes and Tengfang·Present Times” for Shawan Ancient Town
Dialogue with He Shiliang
Yangcheng Evening News: What steps do you need to go through from a blue brick to a brick carving work?
He Shiliang: The processes of brick carving are divided into material selection, cutting, blanking, grouping, polishing, installation, overall, cleaning, etc. The cutting material is to cut off the blank layer on the surface of the old blue bricks to form bricks of equal size and square angles. The draft is designed, composed, and drawn according to the size of the work and the expression of the subject matter. The blanking is based on the line draft, and the part of the base in the picture is chiseled off, and the outline, high and low levels and three-dimensional shape of the work are carved. The final process is to produce fine details, and deeply depict the details on the basis of the rough blank to achieve the effect of careful crafting. Lingnan brick carvings are divided into two categories: single-piece brick carving and combined brick carving. The single-piece brick carving has a simple structure and is often embedded in brackets under the eaves, window grilles, Shenhe frames or small seat decorations. Combined brick carving has a wide range of applications and is often used in large-scale decorations such as walls, softheads, door lintels, hangers and even screen walls. During construction, it is necessary to carve piece by piece according to the pattern. If it is large, thousands of bricks need to be used, and then spliced, inlaid, and polished construction traces according to the parts until they are combined into a complete work.
Yangcheng Evening News: Why do brick carvings have to be made of old blue bricks?
He Shiliang: The hardness of blue bricks is smaller than that of red bricks and is not easy to weather, while Babaylan has a delicate texture. Selecting bricks is very important, so-calledChoose old or new”, we are all bricks that have been removed from old housesCinema finds high-quality bricks. For example, the more than 30,000 bricks used in Baomo Garden’s “Tuyan and Mingbi” were demolished when the Guangzhou Metro Line 1 was built. We found it from construction waste. These old bricks have experienced dozens or even hundreds of years of wind and rain. The texture has been “annealed” and are not easy to burst during carving. The finished products carved are ancient and simple, full of charm.
Yangcheng Evening News: What challenges do you think the inheritance of Lingnan brick carvings face?
He Shiliang: The most important thing in inheriting Lingnan brick carving is to maintain quality and promote the aesthetics of traditional craftsmanship. First of all, it is necessary to inherit teamwork, continue the technical level of the ancestors and the traditional charm of the works, and then innovate, combining traditional charm with modern aesthetics. As for the current creation, it is also necessary to inject more novel techniques and modern elements into the works in ancient techniques, and should be more inclined to develop in a direction that is close to life, magnificent composition, exquisite and unique shapes, and concise and exquisite carvings, adapt to the needs of social aesthetics and be accepted by the public, so that they can have the motivation for inheritance and development.
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