Suzhou embroidery refers to "Suzhou embroidery" in the narrow sense, while Suzhou embroidery in the broad sense is a famous handicraft with Suzhou as the distribution center and spread throughout Jiangsu. It occupies an important position in the history of the development of Chinese arts and crafts. Together with Guangdong embroidery, Hunan embroidery and Shu embroidery, it is known as China's "Four Famous Embroideries".
Fragments of silk fabric woven from domestic silkworm silk 5,000 years ago unearthed from the Qianshanyang ancient site in Wuxing prove that China is the first country in the world to raise silkworms for silk, and it originated in the Taihu Lake Basin. This laid the foundation for the development of Suzhou embroidery. Due to limitations of documents and objects, it is difficult to say exactly when Suzhou embroidery began. However, according to Liu Xiang's "Shuo Yuan", as early as the Spring and Autumn Period more than 2,500 years ago, "embroidery" existed in Wu. Those who wear leopard fur." During the Three Kingdoms period, the sister of Zhao Da, the prime minister of the Eastern Wu Dynasty, was able to use embroidery to embroider China's first mountainous military formation map, which people at the time called "needle perfection". The "Three Kingdoms·Wu Zhi·Biography of Jiang Qin" also records the sentence "The clothes of wives and concubines are all beautifully embroidered", which shows that Suzhou embroidery has reached a considerable level in terms of quantity and quality more than 1,700 years ago.
In the Song Dynasty, Suzhou embroidery had the appearance of appreciative embroidery and reached a certain level. In Zhang Yingwen's book "Secret Collection of the Qing Dynasty", it is said: "The embroidery of the Song Dynasty has fine needles and threads, using only one or two threads, and using needles as fine as hair. The colors are exquisite and the brilliance is striking. The mountains and rivers are far and near. It is interesting that the pavilions are deep, the figures are full of vivid emotions, and the flowers and birds are very graceful and chattering. The best ones are better than paintings." It depicts that Su embroidery in the Song Dynasty has the characteristics of meticulous workmanship and real and vivid images.
There are not many documented records of Su embroidery in the Yuan Dynasty. "Qing Mi Zang" says: "People in the Yuan Dynasty used slightly thicker threads, and the needle placement was not dense, and they used ink to describe the eyebrows and eyes. The people of the Song Dynasty are very skilled in craftsmanship!" It can be seen that the embroidery of the Yuan Dynasty did not make much progress compared to the Song Dynasty.
The Ming Dynasty was an extremely important historical stage in the development of Suzhou embroidery. On the one hand, the growth of social demand for embroidery products promoted the increase in the number of commercial embroidery; on the other hand, the Jiajing period (1522-1566) The emergence of "Luxiangyuan Gu Embroidery" in Shanghai had a decisive influence on the formation of Su embroidery style. Han Ximeng, a representative figure of Gu embroidery, is the granddaughter-in-law of Gu Mingshi, the owner of "Lu Xiangyuan". Her artistic characteristic lies in using painting as a basis to give full play to the expressive ability of embroidery stitches and harmonious colors to achieve vivid and vivid embroidery effects. complement each other. After absorbing her strengths, Su embroidery was completely different from Lu embroidery, Northeastern embroidery, and Beijing embroidery at that time in terms of raw materials, stitching techniques, and embroidery techniques. It formed a beautiful pattern, elegant colors, and lively stitching techniques. The unique style of changeable and fine embroidery work was praised throughout the country. During the Qing Dynasty, Su embroidery has become a widely distributed cottage industry in Suzhou, engaged in phoenix crowns, Xiapei, patchwork, official uniforms, quilt covers, pillowcases, shoe uppers, handkerchiefs, and fan bags. , pendants, purses, draperies, chair drapes, drama costumes and other various kinds of embroidery production. In order to market embroidery, various embroidery shops have emerged, and even professional embroidery lanes have emerged, such as "Embroidery Thread Lane", "Embroidery Alley", etc. Suzhou is known as the "Embroidery City". At that time, double-sided embroidery began to appear, indicating that Su embroidery had a high degree of artistic skill. At that time, most of the daily embroidery or artistic embroidery for the royal family was made by Su embroidery artists. Among the people, a large number of Su embroidery artists such as Cai Qunxiu, Shen Ying, Shen Li, Zhu Xinbai, Xu Zhiqin, Qian Hui, Lin Shu, Zhao Huijun, Shen Guanguan, Yang He, Jin Cailan, Jiang Mouzhen, Pan Zhiyu, Zhang Yuanzhi, Guo Tongxian and others stand out. Became a famous embroiderer at that time. Among them, the most outstanding one is Shen Shou, a Suzhou embroidery artist in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China. She absorbed the principles of light and shade in Western paintings, paid great attention to the lifelikeness of objects, pioneered "simulation embroidery", and improved, developed, promoted and disseminated Suzhou embroidery techniques. , played a positive role and has epoch-making significance in the history of Chinese embroidery. During the Republic of China, due to social unrest, the Japanese invasion of China, and the depression of all industries, Suzhou embroidery production showed a deteriorating trend. Many small and medium-sized embroidery shops closed down one after another, and artists and embroidery workers changed jobs. On the eve of liberation, the embroidery shops in Suzhou dropped from 100 to 100 in their heyday. There were more than fifty companies, but the number has declined to more than twenty, and there are only a few professional workers engaged in embroidery production.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, under the guidance of the Party's policy of "protecting, developing and improving" arts and crafts, local governments promoted the sale of embroidery products and increased the production of embroidery workers by organizing urban and rural material exchanges. Positivity. Wuxian Zhenhu, Cangshu, Guangfu, Tong'an, Dongzhu, Mudu, Xukou and other towns and villages have almost reached a scale where "every household has an embroiderer and every household has an embroiderer". According to statistics in 1990, there were 120,000 embroiderers in Wu County, more than any other dynasty in history. Su embroidery has entered a new period of all-round development and improvement. In 1958, Suzhou began to promote machine embroidery. In the late 1980s, computer embroidery was partially adopted, which greatly improved the production capacity of daily embroidery. Embroidery products can be found everywhere in dozens of tourist spots and hundreds of dealerships in Suzhou city. In the embroidery industry, the division of labor is becoming more and more detailed. Among them are the Suzhou Embroidery Research Institute, which specializes in the research of embroidery stitches and techniques, the Suzhou Embroidery Factory, which is engaged in the production of embroidery ornaments and export clothing, and the Suzhou Embroidery Factory, which is engaged in the production of embroidered daily necessities. , Suzhou Embroidery Children's Clothing Factory and Suzhou Children's Products Factory, which are engaged in the production of children's embroidered clothes and daily necessities, Suzhou Theater Costumes and Tools Factory, which is engaged in the embroidery and production of costumes and costumes, Suzhou Craft Shoes Factory, which is engaged in the production of embroidered shoes, and Embroidery Thread Production Suzhou Flower Thread Factory, etc.
During the period from the 1970s to the 1990s, this Suzhou embroidery army not only produced a large number of daily embroidery products every year to meet market demand, but also expanded new categories, adopted new materials, and applied A lot of exploration and efforts have been made in new technologies and other aspects, and various technical methods such as embroidery and inlay, inlay, printing, pasting, carving and painting have been comprehensively used to produce batches of products with modern aesthetics, making Su embroidery Daily necessities have quickly developed into more than ten categories and more than 2,000 varieties. The products are exported to more than 100 countries and regions and are loved by people all over the world.
At the same time, Su embroidery artworks are even more famous in the embroidery world for their graceful appearance. In addition to the most common themes such as "kittens" and "goldfish", there are also works on various themes such as flowers and birds, animals, landscapes, figures, still lifes, etc., with a range of artistic expression far beyond the past. In terms of technique, works such as the combination of Su embroidery and hair embroidery, the combination of hair embroidery and hair engraving, the combination of embroidery and tapestry, the combination of embroidery and tapestry have also been produced one after another, creating a path for the derivation and development of Su embroidery art. This new path has greatly expanded the expressive capabilities and surface effects of Su embroidery. It is worth mentioning that in 1966, Su embroidery artists created double-sided heterochromatic embroidery with the same stitching method and different colors on both sides of the embroidery. In 1980, Su embroidery artists Qiu Xiuying and Yin Lianjun pioneered the first and successful double-sided heterochromatic embroidery. , strange and different stitch embroidery (double-sided three-different embroidery), the first work "Cat and Dog Picture" miraculously appeared on both sides of different graphics of cats and dogs respectively, breaking through the restricted area of ??double-sided embroidery that the patterns on both sides must be consistent. His skills have reached a level of uncanny craftsmanship. Since then, double-sided and three-different embroidery works have been produced, such as "Golden Monkey and Pug" and "Charles and Diana". What is even more incredible is that a 51-year-old Suzhou man, Gu Jiaqiao, has been studying Suzhou embroidery techniques carefully since 1999, using two human body photography works by Fritz Mansnitsche of Germany and Neil Barr of the United States as his embroidery works. Based on the model, he created the largest double-sided three-dimensional embroidery in the world with a height of 56 cm and a width of 40 cm. At the same time, he created the first human body photography embroidery and embroidered by himself (the existing double-sided three-dimensional embroidery was all made by two people). The best of the two above combined embroidery). Then, he created unique works such as "Moonlight on the Lotus Pond" and "Swan Dance" that used the same thread to show different stitches on both sides of the embroidery, pioneering the integration of traditional embroidery and modern science. In May 2005, after painstaking research, he created a landmark double-sided five-sided embroidery "White Cat and Panda" with different threads (velvet), different scenes, different colors, different stitches, and different stitches. The hidden bright embroidery "Pearl of the Orient", which can reveal all the details of the embroidery, has achieved a major historical breakthrough. In 2011, Suzhou embroiderer Xue Jindi's self-invented Su embroidery technique "Twisted Silk Thread Embroidery Method" and the three-dimensional embroidery method used to express bead-like decorations both obtained national invention patents, injecting new vitality into the innovation and development of Su embroidery.
With the expansion of China’s cultural exchanges with other countries, Suzhou embroidery has become a bond of friendship between people from all over the world. Since 1956, Su embroidery artists Gu Wenxia, ??Xu Zhihui, Zhou Xunxian, Qian Shuyu, Liu Jinyan and others have performed live embroidery art in the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Germany, the former Soviet Union and other countries. Every year, more than 100,000 guests from all over the world come to Suzhou to see the work of embroidery artists and appreciate their works, including former German Prime Minister Kohl and Singaporean Cabinet Minister Lee Kuan Yew. Suzhou embroidery is praised as "living still life" and "the pearl of oriental art". At the same time, nearly 100 national gifts have been given to foreign heads of state, including Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, Chairman Kim Il-sung of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, President Pompidou of France, Prince Sihanouk of Cambodia, Prime Minister Nakasone of Japan, etc. I was delighted to receive exquisite Suzhou embroidery works of art. For example, in 2001, the "Pine and Crane Changchun Picture" embroidered by Suzhou embroiderer Xue Jindi was transferred to Kim Jong Il, General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea, from the Shanghai Jiao Tong University Performance Center. The works of Suzhou Embroidery Research Institute have been exhibited in more than 100 countries. Suzhou Embroidery Factory has formulated the "Suzhou Embroidery Quality Standard" to maintain the inheritance of Su embroidery.
In order to commend the important contributions made by skilled craftsmen in the field of arts and crafts, the State Council has awarded the title of "Experts with Outstanding Contributions" to the national level since 1991, including Xu Shaoqing, Gu Wenxia, ??Zhou Aizhen and Zhou Xunxian in the Suzhou embroidery industry. Enjoy special government subsidies approved by the State Council. Eight people including Xu Shaoqing, Li Eying, Gu Wenxia, ??Ren Xixian, Zhou Xunxian, Yin Lianjun, Zhou Aizhen, and Jiang Xue were awarded the title of "Master of Chinese Arts and Crafts", which is the highest honorary title in the Chinese arts and crafts community.
After the reform and opening up, the collective component of the embroidery industry began to transition to privatization. Private enterprises and folk embroidery shops are opened from time to time and are in the ascendant. Chinese arts and crafts masters Gu Wenxia, ??Ren Xixian, and Jiang Xueying also opened studios named after themselves. In the suburbs of Suzhou, tens of thousands of embroiderers are still active. The processing volume of kimono and hanbok produced by the Suzhou embroidery private enterprise in Dongzhu Town has occupied a large market in Japan and South Korea respectively, becoming China's largest kimono and hanbok processing and export base. The total population of Zhenhu Town is 19,000, and there are 11,000 employees engaged in embroidery, mounting embroidery, and embroidery frame making. More than 280 embroidery shops have opened on one street, including Yao Jianping, Xue Jindi, Yao Huifen, Yao Huiqin, Lu Fuying, Zou Yingzi and other rising stars who can embroider high-end products have won gold and silver in various expos and handicraft competitions. Among them, Xue Jindi's specialty is that she specializes in famous ancient paintings. Each of her works is exquisite and has been recognized by many famous artists.
In 2003, Zhenhu's embroidery sales revenue reached 200 million yuan, and embroidery has become a pillar industry in the local area. In 2000, Zhenhu was awarded the "Hometown of Chinese Folk (Embroidery) Art" by the Ministry of Culture. The reason why Suzhou embroidery is so admirable is that it is a comprehensive reflection of its varieties, shapes, patterns, drawings, stitches, embroidery methods, colors, techniques, mounting, etc. The use of stitches is what makes up the various artistic images of embroidery. language. The "Xue Shen Embroidery Manual", dictated by Shen Shou and written down by Zhang Jian, brings together his lifelong experience in embroidery skills and summarizes 18 kinds of stitches. Through the efforts of later generations, it has now been developed to 43 kinds. The basic acupuncture techniques include: straight stitches, front stitches, reverse stitches, overlapping stitches, flat stitches, loose stitches, set stitches, combined stitches, applying stitches, connecting stitches, rolling stitches, cutting stitches, braiding strands, pulling shuttles, and flat stitching. , plate gold, knotting, knotting, tailing, chicken feather needles, velvet, grid brocade, knitting needles, net embroidery, water pattern needles, osmanthus needles, cross stitch, pine needles, yarn stamping, dotting, random needles, button embroidery, etc. 32 There are 5 kinds of auxiliary needles: pinning needles, spreading needles, hair-raising needles, spiral needles, scale-engraving needles, etc.; variant embroidery needles include: overlay embroidery, bead threading, curtain embroidery, nail embroidery, damask sticking, and virtual and solid needles. Wait 6 kinds. In the process of embroidering ornaments, artists often use a variety of stitching methods in order to better express the morphological characteristics of the object. For example, when embroidering a cat, trocars are used for the wool, trocars and needles are used for the eyeballs and whites of the eyes, and rolling needles are used for the beards and eye sockets. Through the flexible application of needlework, the embroidered images are real, vivid and full of texture.
Among the many stitches of Suzhou embroidery, random stitch embroidery has suddenly emerged, and artists have used this stitch to create many masterpieces. Random stitch embroidery, also known as "Zhengze embroidery", was created by modern embroidery artist Yang Shouyu in the 1930s when he was teaching at Zhengze Women's Vocational School. This stitching method changes the traditional embroidery method of "closely connecting the needles and aligning the threads". It uses long and short intersecting lines to express the picture by layering and adding colors. It is especially suitable for embroidering works based on oil paintings, sketches, and photography. The artistic effect of his works is particularly textured. After being taught and promoted by famous Su embroidery masters such as Zhou Xunxian, Ren Xianxian and Zhu Feng from Yang Shouyu's sect, random stitch embroidery has become one of the main embroidery types of Su embroidery. His works include "Lenin by the Razliv River", "Stone Statue of Qi Bai", "Tiger Hill", "Steaming Pond", etc. On the basis of random stitch embroidery, we have also innovatively developed embroidery techniques such as virtual and real random stitch embroidery, double-sided random stitch embroidery, double-sided strange embroidery and double-sided different colors and different stitches (double-sided three different embroidery), etc. The art of needlepoint has been taken to a whole new level.
Suzhou embroidery also has a kind of "golden embroidery". Its embroidery method uses gold threads to coil and the silk threads to be nailed horizontally, so it is also called "nail embroidery". It is mainly used to embroider dragons and phoenixes, landscapes, flowers and other decorative patterns on dragon robes, official uniforms, formal dresses, cheongsams and theatrical costumes. The works are resplendent, graceful and luxurious. In its heyday, there were thousands of embroiderers in the villages around Suzhou engaged in embroidering panjin embroidery. In the Xinnan Village area of ??Changqiao Town, there were still more than 400 veteran artists processing decorative patterns for clothing in Guangdong, Singapore and other places. The craft is boring and monotonous, and the labor price is not high. People are unwilling to practice this skill, and there are no successors to Panjin Embroidery.
The technical characteristics of Su embroidery can be roughly divided into "flat (the embroidery surface is flat), Qi (the stitches are neat), thin (the embroidery thread is thin), dense (the threads are arranged tightly), harmonious (the colors are harmonious), and smooth ( It can be summed up in eight characters: "smooth silk strands", "glossy color" and "even skin", which is different from embroidery in other parts of the country. Suzhou embroidery varieties can be divided into two major categories. One is daily necessities. There are small daily necessities, such as purse bags, spice bags, glasses bags, folding fan bags, business card bags, smooth bags, round fans, mirror covers, small pendants, etc. There are clothing, shoes and hats, such as shawls, cheongsams, skirts, vests, bibs, shirts, tiger-head shoes, tiger-head hats, as well as Japanese kimonos and Korean clothes processed and exported. There are indoor supplies, such as quilt covers, pillowcases, table surrounds, chair covers, chair cushions, door curtains, tablecloths, sofa cushions, electric fan covers, TV sets, air conditioner covers, etc. And other supplies such as official uniforms, car and sedan decorations, theater clothes, shrouds, etc. The traditional patterns of daily necessities are characterized by a prominent center of the pattern structure, exaggerated plastic arts, and rich decorative taste. Common forms include single-corner flowers, diagonal flowers, four-corner flowers, a group of four-corner flowers, full-bottom flowers, etc. When it comes to the use of colors, Su embroidery has always been about beauty, plainness and tranquility, adding color to everything, being flashy but not vulgar, and pure but not gaudy. This is one of the important features that distinguishes it from other embroidery. This is consistent with Suzhou people's preference for elegance and beauty, and is also closely related to Suzhou embroidery's ability to develop delicate and elegant characteristics.
The second is appreciation. There are ornaments (table screens of various sizes such as long, square, and round), pendants (pictures, vertical scrolls, lenses, nave, couplets, etc.), standing items (single screen, folding screen, etc.) and albums, etc. It has a wide range of themes, including landscapes, figures, flowers, birds, animals, still lifes, calligraphy, decorative patterns, etc., which can be vividly expressed. The most famous representative works among the ornaments are "Kitten" and "Goldfish". In order to vividly express the fluffy fur and expression of the kitten, the embroiderers not only need thousands of needles and threads, but also must pay great attention to the use of colors. Just for a small cat's eye, more than twenty colored threads must be used to express it according to the different light-receiving parts of the pupil. Only in this way can the cat's eye embroidery be "live". In 1986, at the Sixth Plovdiv International Spring Fair held in Bulgaria, a double-sided embroidery "Long Haired Cat" presented by Suzhou Embroidery Factory won the gold medal. To embroider goldfish, in order to express the transparent texture of the goldfish tail, embroiderers often have to "split" a hair-thick silk thread into one forty-eighth to embroider. The embroidered goldfish is so stunning that it looks like it is swimming in the water. , giving people a beautiful enjoyment.
In 1984, a double-sided embroidery "Goldfish" presented by the Suzhou Embroidery Research Institute won the gold medal at the 56th International Exposition in Poznan, Poland.
Suzhou embroidery, as an ancient art that has been passed down and multiplied for thousands of years, has played an important role in beautifying people's lives in the past dynasties. In October 1986, Suzhou City established the China Suzhou Embroidery Art Museum in the Ming Dynasty Wangji Temple on Jingde Road. It displays more than 200 pieces of embroidery from the Han Dynasty to the present, including embroidery from the Tomb of King Yan in Dabaotai, Beijing, and Hunan Daily necessities such as Suzhou embroidery pieces, sutras, and jackets (some of which are replicas) unearthed from Han Tomb No. 1 in Mawangdui, Changsha, and Huqiu Pagoda in Suzhou; there are the tapestry robes of Emperor Wanli of the Ming Dynasty and those of Empress Xiaojing made in Suzhou. Embroidered "Bai Zi Yi" and replicas of Emperor Qianlong's court uniforms of the Qing Dynasty; there are embroidery albums by the famous embroidery artist Han Ximeng in the 17th century, simulated embroidery by Shen Shou, a Su embroidery artist in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China, as well as modernly developed double-sided heterochromatic embroidery and double-sided heterochromatic embroidery. Works such as embroidery with different colors and different stitches have become an important window to showcase the history and quality of Su embroidery and are welcomed by people. The Chinese Embroidery Art Museum was built in Zhenhu, the birthplace of Su embroidery.