Basic Introduction to Qingyang Embroidery
Embroidery is a major category of folk arts and crafts in Qingyang, widely distributed across thousands of households. The embroidery from Qingyang and Zhengning counties is the most famous.
Qingyang embroidery includes a wide variety of items such as clothing, cushions, shoe uppers, sock soles, pillow tops, belly bands, ear pillows, hats, sachets, tobacco pouches, needle cases, and cloth toys. Although not as renowned as Suzhou embroidery or other embroidery schools, it has a long history, a strong foundation, and a unique style. As the living standards of people in the old revolutionary base area continue to rise, it shines with an increasingly enchanting brilliance.
The colors of Qingyang embroidery are bright, clearly layered, and strongly contrasting, deep but not murky, vibrant yet not gaudy. In terms of color configuration, red, black, blue, and white are the primary hues, achieving a striking, vivid, pure, elegant, and powerful effect.
Qingyang is one of the birthplaces of the Chinese nation and Chinese civilization, and an important repository of cultural resources. Incense pouches, Longxiu (embroidery from Longdong region), folk paper-cuttings, Daoqing shadow plays, and Longdong folk songs are known as the “five wonders” of Qingyang. Vivid animal embroideries and tranquil, beautiful landscape patterns… one by one, these realistic embroidery pictures are displayed in their shops, attracting a steady stream of women seeking to learn embroidery techniques and customers looking on. Every year around the Dragon Boat Festival, women in Qingyang make embroidered sachets in various small animal shapes for their children to wear as a means to “ward off evil and misfortune and turn bad luck into good.”
The Significance of Qingyang Embroidery
(1) It reflects the aesthetic consciousness and pursuit of the people of Qingyang. To some extent, this represents their pursuit of the meaning of life and quality of life. I once saw the ancient dwellings of the Bai people in Dali, Yunnan, and was greatly impressed by their pursuit of the quality of life, feeling that our cave dwellings were too simple and crude. However, looking at Qingyang embroidery, I realized that the people of Qingyang do not lack a pursuit of beauty in life. For example, even a shoe pad, which is placed underfoot and hardly noticed, is embellished with flowers, vivid and eye-catching. This demonstrates the refinement of the people of Qingyang's requirements for life. Even the pillows and shoe pads for deceased elders are adorned with flowers.
(2) It showcases the profound cultural heritage and rich imagination and creativity of the people of Qingyang. The five-poison patterns in Longdong incense pouches are intended to ward off evil. The twelve zodiac signs and lion and tiger motifs serve as amulets. As for pomegranates and buddhist hands on pillowcases and shoe pads, they are largely symbolic of many children, blessings, and longevity, all imbued with cultural significance. As for the large hanging pieces in today's incense pouches, such as peacocks playing among peonies and carp leaping through the dragon gate, their cultural meanings go without saying. This also demonstrates the rich imagination and creativity of the people of Qingyang.
(3) It reflects the commercial awareness of contemporary people of Qingyang. Originally, Qingyang embroidery, as a traditional handicraft, was only made and used within the family, “produced and sold by oneself.” With the development of commodity economy, it has also stepped out of the secluded boudoir and entered the market, becoming a commodity. This can be considered progress and an awakening of commercial awareness among the people of Qingyang. We all know that the people of Qingyang have been influenced by traditional agrarian culture, with deeply ingrained views favoring agriculture over commerce, and we still see many homes with inscriptions about farming and reading. Now that incense pouches are being produced and sold as commodities, this can be seen as a challenge and departure from traditional thinking, something that deserves full recognition and affirmation.
In addition, incense pouches can probably be regarded as spiritual products. According to predictions by relevant experts, with the great development of social productive forces, the value of spiritual products will increasingly surpass that of material production, because after material life becomes extremely abundant, people will turn to the demand for spiritual life.
Product Characteristics
The content of Qingyang embroidery is rich and diverse in form. Looking at the objects of embroidery, in addition to the aforementioned incense pouches, pillows, and shoe pads, there are also belly bands, door curtains, bed covers, and bed headboards. In terms of content, flowers, birds, fish, and insects can all be embroidered. For example, with incense pouches: flowers include lotuses, birds include phoenixes, and insects include many more, such as cicadas, scorpions, centipedes, grasshoppers, dragonflies, and even dung beetles. Nowadays, there are even more combination pieces, such as fish playing among lotus flowers, mandarin ducks playing in water, peacocks playing among peonies, dragons and phoenixes presenting auspiciousness, the Eight Immortals crossing the sea, lions rolling a ball of embroidery, truly a dazzling array of colorful presentations. In terms of embroidery techniques, there are solid embroidery, hollow embroidery, hidden-needle embroidery, twisted-thread edging, reverse-hook stitch, and others. Because different methods are used, the resulting patterns exhibit different characteristics, either ornate and rich, simple and clear, or neat and plain.
In addition, Qingyang embroidery pays great attention to both decorative and practical aspects. For example, shoe pads and pillowcases are mostly embroidered on a backing fabric, with compact patterns and fine stitches, often stitched back and forth to create a double-sided pattern for durability. On soft fabrics, the tufting method is commonly used, also finely stitched and sturdy. Sometimes the backing fabric wears out, but the embroidery remains intact and bright. As practical items, such as “needle cases,” which should also be classified as incense pouches, they are not festival-specific. Women wear them throughout the year to hold needles and threads. A needle case consists of two parts: the lid and the core. The lids are generally similar, like human blouses, small and narrow, hence why people describe small blouses as resembling needle case lids. The cores are usually pear-shaped, peach-shaped, or mandarin duck-shaped, with needles inserted into the core and covered with the lid. They are typically worn on the body for convenience when needed.
Another characteristic of Qingyang embroidery is its simplicity and rustic charm. Whether in the selection of materials, the matching of colors, the design of patterns, or the embroidery techniques used, it appears ancient and simple, unlike the light and ethereal qualities of Hunan and Sichuan embroidery.