Gourd carving (Dongchang gourd carving)

Name of China's national intangible cultural heritage: gourd carving (Dongchang gourd carving)

Applicant: Liaocheng City, Shandong Province

Item No.: 837

Project No.: Ⅶ - 61

Time of publication: 2008 (second batch)

Category: traditional art

Region: Shandong Province

Type: new item

Applicant: Liaocheng City, Shandong Province

Protection unit: cultural center of Dongchangfu District, Liaocheng City

Gourd carving (Dongchang gourd carving) Introduction:

Applicant: Liaocheng City, Shandong Province

Dongchang gourd carving technology is popular in Liaocheng City, Shandong Province. Its distribution centers on Tangyi Town, Dongchangfu District, and covers Liangshui Town, Yansi office and Xinji Town, now Guanxian county.

During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Dongchangfu, as one of the nine commercial ports along the Beijing Hangzhou Grand Canal, was the political, economic and cultural hub of Luxi Plain. It had been prosperous for more than 400 years. Since ancient times, Dongchang has used carved gourds to keep the crabs. In this case, the carved gourd with local characteristics has become an important commercial product of farmers on both sides of the canal. In the 1930s and 1940s, Dongchang carved gourd was sold all over the country. After the founding of new China, it still maintained a good momentum of development and once flourished.

Dongchang gourd carving materials, skilled carving, smooth lines, rich patterns, well-made, showing a distinctive regional characteristics. This gourd carving technology combines elegant modeling skills with realistic techniques, forming a complete set of art system. Most of the finished gourds are engraved with auspicious patterns and patterns to express the ancient cultural themes of reproduction worship and totem worship. In the long history of development, the inheritance of gourd carving skills in Dongchang has been carried out in strict accordance with the way of teachers and apprentices, and has been going on from generation to generation.

Dongchang gourd carving is a treasure of Chinese folk art. The particularity of materials, the universality of subjects, the uniqueness of techniques and the diversity of styles are rare in other traditional crafts, which can provide important reference for the study of traditional folk art, Shandong history and culture and canal culture. Dongchang carved gourd has a wide range of uses. It can be used as daily utensils, sacrificial articles, handicrafts, life ornaments and medicine. The patterns and patterns carved on the gourd are full of auspicious meanings and rich cultural connotations. Excavation, rescue and protection of Dongchang gourd carving technology will help to enrich people's spiritual and cultural life and promote the construction of a harmonious society.