A Charming Town with Folk Painting 杨柳青年画英文介绍

A Charming Town with Folk Painting

Sabrina Chinese Lunar New Year is a grand festival to celebrate, if you’re in Tianjin and want to know some culture about it, there is a relaxing and interesting place to go. It’s a historic town with enchanting traditional Chinese culture and its name is Yang Liuqing.

As a historic town with thousands of years of culture and legacy, Yang Liuqing is famous for Yang Liuqing Folk Painting of the Luanr New Year. This painting is one of the three famous New Year Paintings in China, which first appeared in Yang Liuqing Town in

17th century. It combines the methods of woodcarving and manual color drawing characters. Yang Liuqing Folk Painting takes the raw materials from daily life, or some folk customs and stories. And it’s characterized by combination of block print and colored hand drawing. In tradition, people liked to stick these paintings for luck in

the Chinese Lunar New Year. Now, people regard the paintings as national treasures and stored them as a collection. At the town, many stores sell these paintings, showing that tradition is still essential for modern life.

It is said that where there Chinese people, there are Chinese Lunar New Year Paintings, and so is Yang Liuqing. This ancient

town is famous for its folk art during four centuries, and these glorious traditional Chinese culture will still shines there.

Zhang Clay Figurines Pass Down the Legacy of Culture

Sabrina When you walk into the Ancient Culture Street of Tianjin, you may feel surprise about the transition from metropolitan high buildings to small, grey brick buildings. Art is all over the narrow street, and the vivid clay sculptures will mostly draw your eyes.

In Tianjin, the concept and art of clay sculpting was attached to a family: niren Zhang. Zhang Clay Figurines have passed down the legacy of clay sculpting for 180 years since its origins in the Qing Dynasty. The art takes it name from Zhang Mingshan, its initiator. He observed people from different walks of life in different places and would work those observations into his sculpted pieces. He brought originality and imagination to his work. His subject extent was wide and would apply bright colors.

Figurine making requires the skills of stone carvers, painters, and papercut makers. When the basic figurines is detailed, it needs to be coated with varnish to preserve the color. Clay figurines are not

fired to dry like pottery. Instead, the final step consists of leaving the figurine to dry in the shade. The entire process lasts at least one week. Images most commonly applied to figurines are flowers, animals, and patterns that convey auspicious meanings. Though simple in style, the images are strong, vivid and impressive.

In recent years, Zhang Clay Figurines have been serving as a bridge of culture exchanges between China and other countries. This traditional folk art passed down from generation to generation will continue to develop and prosper.