Source: People's Daily
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Liu Xianglan and her grandson participate in the Li Jin skills show. (Photo courtesy of Hainan Wuzhishan Rong Media Center)
【Highlights of the show】
Spinning, dyeing, weaving, embroidery...... Liu Xianglan, the national representative inheritor of the traditional textile dyeing, weaving and embroidery skills of the Li nationality, and a native of Fanmao Village, Wuzhishan City, Hainan Province, have focused on the inheritance and promotion of Li Jin skills for more than 40 years, constantly breaking the tradition, pioneering and innovating, and making the traditional skills of Li Jin weaving glow with new vitality.
sit on the floor with a belt wrapped around your waist; Straighten your legs and step on the warp stick...... After fixing the warp beams at both ends of the loom, Liu Xianglan divided the warp yarn into two layers with a warp stick, inserted the weft with both hands, and held the brocade wooden knife in her right hand at the same time. Heald rod jacquard, broken weft weaving, complex skills to weave exquisite patterns.
The weaving tool used by Liu Xianglan is a waist loom, and the weaving technique used is the traditional brocade weaving technique of the Li nationality.
"I started learning to weave brocade when I was 13 years old, with my mother." With the rise and fall of the heald pole, Liu Xianglan recounted her experience when she first learned brocade. 40 years have passed in a blink of an eye, and now the Li brocade she weaves sells well at home and abroad.
"The Nine Immortals and Weaver Girls went down to the mortal world and created the 3,000-year-old ...... of Li Jin" The handicraft of the Chinese nation is both traditional and fashionable. Liu Xianglan introduced that each weaving and embroidering of a Li Jin work needs to go through four steps: spinning, dyeing, weaving and embroidery, which takes at least three or four months. Between warp and weft, Li Jin is the art of polishing with time.
"Spinning cloth is generally to collect island cotton and wild hemp in the rainy season, and slowly rub it with a spinning wheel." Liu Xianglan said that this step is the most patient test and often takes the longest. The coarse fibers are first stained into linen, which is then kneaded into linen, which is eventually woven into fine, soft fabric.
She broke a stick of turmeric and soaked it in water, and gently rubbed it with a knife, and the water suddenly became golden. Soak the fabric in this golden water, and soon the fabric will be dyed with color. "Turmeric stems can be dyed yellow, blue indigo leaves are yellow-black, wild chestnut bark, sumac, and maple bark are also commonly used dyeing raw materials."
In Liu Xianglan's Li Jin works, the background color is black, blue-black, and occasionally red. White, yellow, green, purple, etc. appear more as a comprehensive combination. "The traditional Li brocade blue and black color is mostly dirt-resistant and easy to wash when working." Liu Xianglan said, "Now the days are better, and the color matching is richer than before." ”
Among the four steps of Li brocade, "weaving" may not be the most difficult and time-consuming, but it is the most varied and dynamic. On a small loom, there are 17 kinds of tools; Front weaving, reverse weaving and double-sided weaving, the weaving method is different; The warp and weft lines are arranged and staggered, combining a variety of possibilities. Li Jin uses a waist loom to weave, the weaver sits on the ground, uses the body as a frame, throws a shuttle and beats the weft, and the complexity and splendor of the jacquard even exceeds that of a professional machine.
Liu Xianglan stood up and began to introduce Li Jin's works hanging in the room. "The patterns of these three works are integrated with the characteristics of the Li ethnic group, and the one is embroidered with mandarin ducks...... she said, and there are at least 100 kinds of embroidery patterns in Li Jin, which convey people's yearning for a better life.
Li Jin, who is so fascinating, once faced the situation of having no successor. In the past, Li Jin was a difficult craft to learn, and he could only rely on the master to practice with his apprentices. In Liu Xianglan's view, Li Jin's inheritance needs to adapt to the changes of the times. So, in 2005, she set up a brocade company to bring together the women of the village to weave brocade. Two years later, with the help of relevant departments, she founded the Wuzhishan Li Brocade Workshop, and held free brocade skills training courses
In the past, only women could learn Li brocade weaving, but Liu Xianglan passed on her brocade weaving skills to her son, who in turn passed it on to her grandson. The youngest grandson, Wang Chengye, began to learn brocade at the age of 3, and now he is just 7 years old, and has learned 4 kinds of Li brocade patterns.
Liu Xianglan also combines traditional Li Jin with modern craftsmanship to develop cultural and creative products. When exquisite patterns appear on bags, shirts, ties, and even mosquito repellent stickers and business card cases, Li Jin's charm gradually becomes famous.
In June 2009, Liu Xianglan was rated as the national representative inheritor of the traditional spinning, dyeing, weaving and embroidery skills of the Li nationality; In the same year, the traditional spinning, dyeing, weaving and embroidery skills of the Li nationality were included in the first batch of UNESCO's "List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Protection". Today, more than 10 years later, Li brocade weaving is one of the few projects listed on the "Urgent Conservation List" that significantly improves the endangered situation, and more than 2,100 Li women are engaged in Li brocade weaving in Wuzhishan City alone.
"There are no two Li Jin paintings in the world, and Li Jin should continue to innovate and develop." Liu Xianglan said, "Li Jin's color is to show vitality in a strong visual impact. Inheriting the old skills, we must not stick to the old, we must continue to seek innovation and change, so that Li Jin can show stronger vitality. ”
