Back قص الورق الصيني Arabic Tszyançji Azerbaijani Chinese paper cutting DAG Chinese paper cutting DGA Papel cortado chino Spanish Txinako paper ebakia Basque Papier découpé chinois French Chinese paper cutting GPE Chinese pepa ŋwaarɛ GUR 剪紙 Japanese
| Chinese paper cutting | |||||||
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 Paper cutting with the symbol for Spring (春) | |||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 剪紙 | ||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 剪纸 | ||||||
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The traditional art of paper cutting (Chinese: 剪紙; pinyin: jiǎnzhǐ) in China may date back to the 2nd century CE, when paper was invented by Cai Lun, a court official of the Eastern Han dynasty.[1][2] On May 20, 2006, paper cutting has been officially listed as one of the earliest intangible cultural heritage of China, issue by Shanxi Culture Department.[3][4] It is put on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009.[5]
Prior to the invention of paper, ancient Chinese used silver and gold leaf to create similar patterns of decorations.[6] Paper cutting became popular as a way of decorating doors and windows as paper became more accessible. These elaborate cutting designs are created with scissors or artwork knives[6][7] and can include a variety of shapes, such as symbols and animals. As paper became more affordable in Eastern Han dynasty, paper-cutting became one of the most important types of Chinese folk art. Later, this art form spread to other parts of the world, with different regions adopting their own cultural styles.
Since the cut-outs are often used to decorate doors and windows, most paper cuts are called "hua", which means "flower". "Flower" refers to the meaning of pattern instead of the botanic beauty.[2] For different use of decorations, they are sometimes referred as different "hua". The paper cuts that used to decorate the window, it is called "window flowers" (窗花; chuāng huā) or "window paper-cuts".[8] For those used as sencils for embroidery called "hat flower" (帽花; mao hua), "pillow flower" (枕花; zhen hua), "shoe flower" (鞋花; xie hua).[9] Usually, the artworks are made of red paper, as red is associated with festivities and luck in Chinese culture, but other colours are also used. Normally cut-paper artwork is used on festivals such as Chinese New Year, weddings and childbirth, as cut-paper artwork is considered to symbolize luck and happiness.[10]
- ^ "Chinese Paper Cutting". www.lapl.org. Retrieved 2025-02-26.
- ^ a b Wu, Fatima (2004). "A Glimpse of Chinese Culture Through Papercuts" (PDF). Education About Asia. 9 (1): 40–46.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
:6was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ "中国剪纸 – 中国非物质文化遗产网·中国非物质文化遗产数字博物馆". www.ihchina.cn (in Chinese). Retrieved 2023-05-13.
- ^ "UNESCO - Chinese paper-cut". ich.unesco.org. Retrieved 2025-02-26.
- ^ a b Zhang, Daoyi (Nov 3, 1989). The Arts of Chinese Papercuts (Beijing: Foreign Language Press). China Folk Art Series.
- ^ "Paper Cutting". Smithsonian's National Museum of Asian Art. Retrieved 2025-02-26.
- ^ Yang, Crystal Hui-Shu (2012-04-01). "Cross-Cultural Experiences Through an Exhibition in China and Switzerland: "The Art of Paper-Cutting: East Meets West"". Source: Notes in the History of Art. 31 (3): 29–35. doi:10.1086/sou.31.3.23208592. JSTOR 23208592.
- ^ Chinese Papercutting Patterns for Seasonal Festivals. Taipei: Minsu Yishu Chuban- she. 1979.
- ^ Meng, Meng; Zhao, Mingtian; Zhu, Song-Chun (2010-10-25). "Artistic paper-cut of human portraits". Proceedings of the 18th ACM international conference on Multimedia. MM '10. New York, NY, USA: Association for Computing Machinery. pp. 931–934. doi:10.1145/1873951.1874116. ISBN 978-1-60558-933-6.