During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, woodcut New Year pictures in southern Shanxi reached its peak, with legendary historical figures and opera figures as the main themes, forming a rough, bold and concise artistic feature, which occupies an extremely important position in the history of New Year pictures.
The origin of New Year pictures in southern Shanxi is rich in cultural connotation and legendary historical color, and it is one of the most famous origins of ancient New Year pictures. Since the Song Dynasty, the woodcut engraving printing of New Year pictures in Jiangzhou, Linfen, Shanxi Pingshui, Hong Tong, Zhao Cheng, Xiangfen, Quwo, Jishan and other places in the southwest has formed a regional scale, and * * * has become a famous New Year picture producing area in southern Shanxi.
Later, two woodcut New Year pictures of Song and Jin Dynasties, Elegance and Elegance of Sui Dynasty and Throne of Wu Yong 'an, were found in the ancient pagoda in Heicheng Town, Gansu Province. The pictures are engraved with the words "Pingyang Jijia Engraving" and "Pingyang Xu Jiayin" respectively. The carved lines are smooth and delicate, and the composition is full and gorgeous, which embodies the extremely high artistic and technical level of Shanxi woodcut New Year pictures.
Influenced by the Yellow River culture, folk customs and opera art in southern Shanxi, the woodcut New Year pictures in southern Shanxi have formed their own unique style. In terms of line treatment, modeling style and coloring techniques, they have condensed and formed the rough and unconstrained Yellow River culture, exquisite and vigorous local operas and smooth historical mural Shu Ya.
When making New Year pictures, first of all, the traditional painting method is used to make a general shape combination with double hook iron wire. After carving, the knife taste, wood taste and line strength are unified, and the character modeling and expression methods are unified, forming a unique image.
Jinnan New Year Pictures combine the stylized facial makeup and typicality of China traditional opera art with the restriction of carving techniques, so that every artistic image is full of exquisite, elegant and humorous charm. The extreme exaggeration of dynamic performance makes disproportionate modeling full of artistic rationalization.
Most New Year pictures in southern Shanxi pursue fullness, integrity, simplicity, generalization, richness and symmetry in composition, thus making the picture harmonious and unified. And often use panoramic, semi-panoramic, serial way to express objects at will.
As the ancestor of New Year pictures, New Year pictures in southern Shanxi flourished in Song Dynasty, Jin Dynasty to Yuan Dynasty, Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty, and spread for a long time, surpassing Yangliuqing in Tianjin, Yangjiabu and Hehe in Weifang.
South Zhuxian Town and Suzhou Taohuawu are centuries earlier. Its main representatives are Jiangzhou New Year Pictures and Pingyang New Year Pictures.
The production of Jiangzhou woodblock New Year pictures has its profound historical, social roots and rich cultural background. The world-famous Jianggang was one of the three major hills in the Song Dynasty. Post is to engrave ink pens on stone walls or wooden boards for literati to copy, and engraving post also affects and promotes woodblock New Year pictures.