New Lease of Life
A university professor seeks to save the endangered cultural heritage of the Miao ethnic minority By Ma Li
Zhang Xiaosong is Dean of the School of International Tourism and Culture at Guizhou Normal University in Guiyang, capital city of southwest China’s Guizhou Province. But her work is not limited to teaching at university. Zhang is also a village researcher.
Over the past 26 years, Zhang has visited more than 700 villages in 89 counties across Guizhou, a multi-ethnic province which is home to time-honored traditions and customs with distinctive ethnic minority characteristics. With her endeavor, Zhang has established close ties with many intangible culture handicraftsmen living in villages.
“We are a family. They give strength and motivation to my work,” Zhang told Beijing Review during a design competition for cultural and creative tourist commodities held in Qingzhen County, Guiyang, on August 20.
As one of its organizers, Zhang said the event, the first of its kind, was intended to help Guizhou’s local distinctive handicrafts and tourist goods gain recognition outside the province.
“Such products that combine the traditional culture and fresh creativity together are very popular in market,” Zhang said.
With inspiration gained from a multi-day tour of several Guizhou villages arranged by the event organizers, participants, most of whom were academics and students from Guizhou and Taiwan, created a total of 66 artworks for the competition.
“The trip to Guizhou Province was short but fruitful. It serves as a bridge of cultural communication across the Taiwan Straits,” said Hong Quanhu, a professor at Yuan Ze University in Taoyuan City, Taiwan.
“Now I have a better understanding of the culture of Guizhou,” Hong said.
A master of traditional arts
Guizhou’s 49 ethnic minorities make the province China’s fourth largest ethnic minority region and a place where long-standing skills and techniques in the textile arts are well preserved and promoted.
Yang’er Yeniu is a woman of the Miao. The Miao group is Guizhou’s largest ethnic minority. The 39-year-old Yang’er is also an inheritor and promoter of the traditional craft of batik. Widely practiced for centuries throughout South Asia and South East Asia, most notably in Indonesia, the art also has a long history among southwest China’s ethnic minorities and is one of Guizhou’s 85 designated items of national intangible heritage. The production of traditional Miao costumes involves weaving patterns into fabrics, typically cotton and hemp, applying hot wax and then dyeing the cloth with indigo. Traditional designs include flowers and mythical fantastic creatures such as dragons and phoenixes.
Yang’er has never received formal education, but her batik and embroidery work is of great artistic value in Zhang’s eyes. She is especially good at embroidering butterflies, which in Miao myth are the earliest ancestor of all creatures in the world. She creates them in different poses and at different stages of their development.
“She is really talented. She doesn’t make a rough draft; just draws whatever pops into her mind, and they come out smoothly,” Zhang said.
Yang’er mostly uses uncolored burlap cloth, giving her batik a mysterious and natural feel and a unique style that sets it apart from ordinary Miao batik.
Zhang first met Yang’er during one of her field trips and was impressed by Yang’er’s handwork. In 2012, the two met again when Zhang visited an embroidery factory where Yang’er worked.
At that time, Zhang was a culture consultant for Guizhou Time, a tourist development project in Guiyang. The property developer provided Zhang with a rent-free facility and Zhang made it a center for cultural exchange and traditional craft display. Zhang invited folk artists from Guizhou to set up workshops in the center. Yang’er is one of them.
Yang’er now has her own office in the studio building. She has garnered a reputation for her batik and embroidery skills, acquiring a broad