Yangjiabu woodblock New Year pictures have a long history. In the Ming dynasty, there was a grand occasion of "every family printed New Year pictures and the producers tied kites". The paintings and engravings of New Year pictures in Ming Dynasty are exquisite and dense, simple and elegant. At the beginning, Yangjiabu folk woodblock New Year pictures had a narrow theme, mainly carving new year pictures of gods, which catered to the needs of traditional folk customs, mainly painting kitchen gods, door gods, bodhisattvas and jade emperors. In carving, on the one hand, religious woodcuts are used, such as three generations of clansmen, shentu and Men. On the one hand, it draws lessons from the illustrations of novels, operas and science and technology books, and adds Minzishan, Top Ten Busy People and February 2. From the Ming Dynasty to the early Qing Dynasty, there appeared painting shops that relied on New Year pictures, such as Tongshuntang, Jixing, Taihe, Gongmao and Hengshun. In the late Ming dynasty, it was destroyed by war.
In the early Qing Dynasty, Yangjiabu New Year pictures were restored and developed. More than 30 painting shops, such as Wanshun, Gongxing, Zhengyi, Gongtai and Yongsheng, produced a large number of New Year pictures, which increased the variety of New Year pictures and made the painting techniques more skillful, resulting in Zhang Xian shooting dogs, fishing every year, bangs hitting golden toad, Bo Gu four screens and so on. During the Qianlong period of Qing Dynasty, the commercialization of woodblock New Year pictures developed and prospered. In the next century and a half, Yangjiabu was one of the three major painting coins in China, with "hundreds of painting shops and tens of thousands of dry New Year pictures and drawing boards". The theme of New Year pictures has been expanded unprecedentedly, and the pictures of gods praying for disaster relief are more complete. The forms of New Year pictures are divided into door pictures, door pictures and kang pictures. At this time, there were many painting shops, including 82 in Xijiabu, all of which were opened by the Yang family. In the late Qing Dynasty, the elaborately produced Yangliuqing New Year Pictures were introduced and brought to Yangjiabu New Year Pictures. Hit, some artists stopped following suit and began to innovate. Most of the new year's plans are based on traditional Chinese opera stories and case-solving novels, such as "Beating Cherry", "Empty City Plan" and "Fishing to Kill the Family". Later, he created auspicious paintings of "making a fortune", including "five ways to make money, returning home rich", "cash cow", "big spring cow" and "three masters". These works give spiritual sustenance and comfort to the people who were invaded by foreign powers and suffered from the rise of thieves. His representative works include Deer and Crane in the Same Spring, Liu Kaibaizi and Five Blessingg Pengshou.
At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, Yangjiabu woodblock New Year pictures began to innovate. Yang Jiujing, a Dashun painting shop, founded Dongdashun painting shop on behalf of innovators. He supported innovative painters such as Yang and Yang Wandong to break through the stereotypes of Yangjiabu New Year pictures and absorb the characteristics of other painting arts. New paintings, such as flowers and birds in the Four Seasons and Eight Immortals screens, are full of ups and downs and vivid pictures. They also absorbed the pen and ink interest of traditional Chinese painting, printed it in a single ink color at several levels, and printed it as "ink loan", such as "four screens of mountains and rivers", which is simple and elegant and can be sold all year round.
Yangjiabu woodblock New Year pictures have a wide range of themes and rich contents, including idols, door gods, beauties, golden boys, landscapes, flowers and birds, dramatic figures, myths and legends, etc. At the same time, there are also works that reflect folk life and criticize the disadvantages of the times, but the theme of Yangjiabu New Year pictures is jubilation and auspiciousness. Such as good luck, happy new year, congratulations on getting rich, wealth, more than a year, happiness and peace. Like the blessings of relatives and greetings from friends, it constitutes the characteristics of farmers' peace and happiness in the new year, hoping for wealth and peace. There are six main categories of Yangjiabu New Year pictures, namely, Chinese New Year, marriage, busy farming, getting rich every year, and full goldfish. , the door god, the god of wealth, the birthday girl, the kitchen god, etc. Legends and allusions, such as Bao Gong taking office, visiting the thatched cottage, crossing the sea by the Eight Immortals, entertainment and satire, such as boxing, busking and promotion, etc.
The production technology of Yangjiabu New Year pictures is also very unique. The painter first painted with wicker charcoal sticks and incense ashes, and named it "rotten manuscript" On the basis of the rotten manuscript, he completed the original manuscript, the tracing manuscript, stuck it on the pear board and carved the line version and the color version respectively. Then after color matching, paper clamping, printing, color running, etc., manual printing. After the New Year pictures are printed, they should be painted with various colors by hand to make them look natural and vivid.
The production of Yangjiabu New Year pictures is divided into painting, carving, printing, mounting and other processes, each of which is extremely precise and accurate. The practice is to hook out the black draft of the painting first, stick it on the planed pear wood or Tang board, and carve the main line version. After the manuscript is printed, it will be engraved in different colors, printed in color, and finally modified and mounted.
At the time of prosperity, just in autumn, all kinds of art dealers gathered in Yangjiabu. At night, the streets are decorated with lanterns and New Year pictures. More than 5000 businessmen come to buy paintings every year. At that time, selling paintings and singing short essays, the most popular lyrics were: "Su Dongpo sat in Han Xin and asked Xiao He. This number is not without merit, but it is too verbose now. Credit is like three debts, and asking is like asking Zhuge. "
Yangjiabu woodblock New Year pictures, which were born and bred, have stepped onto the elegant art hall step by step. 1983 Spring Festival, Yangjiabu New Year Pictures were exhibited in China Art Museum. In the same year, Yangjiabu New Year Pictures toured 9 countries in America, Europe and Africa. 1987, Yang Fuyuan, a folk artist, was invited to Singapore to paint, carve and print woodblock New Year pictures. In 1990s, a group of Yangjiabu New Year pictures artists went to Brazil, Japan and other countries to perform live performances, which were well received. In 2002, the 76-year-old folk New Year picture artist Yang Luoshu, an authentic descendant of Tongshunde Painting Shop with a history of 200 years, was awarded the honorary title of "Master of Folk Arts and Crafts" by UNESCO. Yang Luoshu/Kloc-started to create woodcuts at the age of 0/8. His "Water Margin" and "The Emperor's Map" The Journey to the West are all wonderful in composition, exquisitely carved, lifelike and full of local flavor, which are deeply loved by people. Today, Yangjiabu, a small village with only 3 10 households and10/50 people, produces more than 20 million woodcut New Year pictures every year, which are exported to all parts of the country and more than 100 countries and regions around the world. Yangjiabu has become an important stop on the thousands of miles folk tourism line in Weifang, Shandong Province. Here, people can enjoy more than 65,438+000 sets of New Year pictures, witness various tools and originals for making New Year pictures since the Ming Dynasty, and watch the mysterious techniques for making New Year pictures on the spot.