Heaven has its times,
Earth its weather,
bamboo its beauty,
and work its craftsmanship;
combine these four and you can achieve the good
- Kao Gong Ji-
(China's earliest written record on handicrafts)
Earth its weather,
bamboo its beauty,
and work its craftsmanship;
combine these four and you can achieve the good
- Kao Gong Ji-
(China's earliest written record on handicrafts)
Final Output
While developing the final and most complex part of the project I didn't have much more time to dedicate this blog, which is a pity! Anyway the whole research, the creative phase and the final solution are presented and fully explained inside the thesis. Anyone interested can go to http://issuu.com/jujifizi/docs/craft_live and consult it online. The presentation for the final dissertation can be downloaded here (it's not comprehensive of the explanations provided orally during the live presentation). For any further information you can contact me on my personal mail. 谢谢再见
Chinese Arts and Crafts Fair /Prototyping
We are trying to support traditional and contemporary Chinese artists and craftsmen by selecting and bringing them to you through this fair. We did it out of personal interest believing in the creation of a new bridge to support Chinese Arts & Crafts while spreading and transmitting their knowledge. READ MORE
Concept Development
The inclusive research carried out during these months over Chinese traditional craftsmanship (full documentation will be included inside the final thesis) helped me understand better the contest I was moving in and the opportunities available.
The creative phase that followed led me to the development of a final concept: Craftlive. Inspired by examples of western exhibitions and fairs, it provides a general solution to be adapted inside multiple contexts, and a specific solution fitting the case of Shanghai city. CraftLive it’s not a fair but more of a multi-experience market, it’s a two-day local event to present and promote traditional knowledge through craftsmen and artists operating inside Shanghai area. Stepping aside from simple commercial interest and pursuing cultural involvement, we want visitors to explore and experience the intangible value of traditional craftsmanship and not just it’s final product. That is why at the centre of the event won’t be artifacts but typical knowledge: the people, with their stories and skills, will convey the quality of narrative enclosed inside each piece of craft. Craftlive aims to become a bridge between local artisans and the city community, it also aims to raise awareness by attracting a sensitive public genuinely interested into original craft expressions. The event will be inclusive of different services, in order to provide a more diverse experience to the visitors and better adapt to artisans profile and needs. Following a strict criteria of evaluation (that ensures a qualitative and sustainable approach), it gathers multiple local realities under the same philosophy and values, creating a recognizable network, enabling visibility, encouraging dialogue and trustworthy relationships. |
Chongming Island 崇明县 Bamboo Master
One cannot live in Shanghai without having a small trip to Chongming Island, especially when interested in traditional craft. A dear Chinese friend and colleague from university took me and another Italian friend to visit Master Shi, a bamboo weaver who makes simple and beautiful objects for everyday use.
He's been doing this job for 50 years. It takes 3 years to learn and his mother was the one teaching him. He likes it and particularly enjoys producing one king of bamboo basket, his favorite and the most sold. This specific element takes around 3-4 hours to be finished. “It costs long time to prepare all the stripes to weave. To make a basket he will need 60 pieces of them, so more then one stick of bamboo” READ MORE |
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Craft Hunting #2
Thanks to some friends I got to know about Mr. Benny Peng of A&B Studio. Since 15 years he's been making fine quality silk albums and boxes all by hand.
Before that he was already famous for his frames, then he simply took interest in this new kind of craftsmanship and started self-teaching himself. Four other people decided to follow him in this little business and they've been working together for the last 10 years, making silk-covered boxes of any sizes and colors while Mr. Benny takes care of special requests, customized products and new designs. He will adapt to your request (inside feasibility limits) providing you with unique pieces. "We use silk fabric with traditional Chinese patterns or plain cotton, but we can also use any fabrics you provide us with (a/n that's the great part of having something handmade). The silk we use comes from Hangzhou (杭州) and each pattern is related to a specific meaning as in Chinese culture." READ MORE |
The Pottery Workshop
Not too far from the lane's gate, in Shaanxi Nan Lu, you can find the colorful and welcoming Pottery Workshop,a whole space serving as Ceramic Art Education and Communication Center.
Here people can take classes or directly rent the space to work on their own creations. The Pottery Workshop was established in Hong Kong in 1985 and counts now with two shops based in Shanghai and four workshops (Hong kong, Jingdezhen, Shanghai, Beijing). Nicole from Brut Cake is one of the artists/designers using this space for her job. I had a small chat with Benjamin Carter, who kindly explained me a bit more about it. They have different types of classes and so far half students are Western and half Chinese (most of them Taiwanese). Moreover they produce and sell their own products and they promote through gallery exhibitions local and international ceramic artists. It seems a very good opportunity for anyone who feels like starting something independently, but with a little support! Check their website at http://www.potteryworkshop.com.cn/index.asp |
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Brut Cake
At the Spring Fair in Central Studios I met Nicole Teng and her creations: unique cups and other handmade ceramics accessories with super-cute paintings on them, pieces of old furniture renewed and bags made out of original 20-year-old Chinese fabrics.
Nicole moved from Taiwan to Shanghai 4 years ago and last year started Brut Cake, her first brand. "By focusing on products created entirely by hand, we hope more people will be moved by and treasure the essence of raw materials. We pursue the beauty of raw materials and hope you can appreciate the core act of creation, as well as the artist’s spirit, in each product from Brut Cake." To learn some more about Nicole and her work visit Brut Cake website at http://brutcake.com/ |
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Folk Handicrafts in Yuyuan
As a showcase for the Shanghai traditional culture, Shanghai Yuyuan Culture Promoting & Publicizing Co., Ltd has established the Yuyuan Folk Handicrafts Performance Team to maintain and develop the traditional handicrafts among the Chinese folks. The Team features a combination of national craftsmen masters in the centuries-old skills of Paper-cutting, Chinese Knotting, Dough Figurine and so on.
Yuyuan Folk Handicrafts Performance Team also works as the cultural emissary in Shanghai, taking part to special performances and festivals. Source: http://www.culture-sh.com/en/Default.aspx |
Craft Hunting #1
Today (10/5/12) I went “Craft Hunting” around the city and I must say Shanghai never lets you down!
I had heard from Liza and Claire (LuRu Home) there was a guy around making wrought iron-woks all by hand, they have one of those woks but not a clue where I could find the maker. On the other hand my friend Yao Yan told me about the beautiful Gui and Miao Embroidery that you can find in one of those hidden and busy streets just in the center of the city! So I decided to kill two birds with one stone, I took the bike (kindly borrowed from my friend Francesca) and I headed to the first spot on the map. I ended up finding more than I expected! Even if I'll have to go back with a Chinese speaker to collect more information, I guess this was the first of many "Craft Hunting" days. READ THE WHOLE REPORT |
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Around Shanghai
Summer is back and so are the street vendors of crafted products around Shanghai!
I chanced upon different guys all selling the same kind of rattan chairs and tables. Apparently the producer is always the same: a factory in Zhejiang Province which makes by hand pieces of furniture using different kinds of rattan and wood. Unfortunately they don't seem to have a website, but on the business card Mr. Yu invites everyone to visit his factory and talk business. Maybe it's worth a try! 我厂经营各种藤制品,选料精良,做工精细 欢迎广大朋友到我厂参观谈业务 于先生 |
Nanjing Yunjin Brocade
Thanks to my dear friend Jing I got the chance to visit, with her and another friend of mine, the Nanjing YunJin Museum which hosts the Nanjing Brocade Research Institute established in 1982 (UNESCO http://www.unesco.org/culture/ich/index.php?RL=00200). Here it's possible to see how the famous YunJin brocade was born and witness some of the few incredibly skilled people still performing this topmost craftsmanship using the same loom of the Song Dynasty (960-1279). There are many different kinds of brocade, YunJin is one of the three most famous in China. The product is a fine silk brocade produced and sold mainly in Nanjing. It's name Yunjin (云锦) comes from the cloud-like colors and patterns of this borcade and the legend of a beautiful princess coming from the sky. Of the four YunJin brocades, ZhuangHua (妆花) is still unworkable with a present-day machine. Cathy kindly led us through this amazing discovery:
“There are many stories and legends related to Yunjin brocade, like the Dream Of The Red Chamber, one of the China's Four Great Classical Novels, which is told to have happened in Nanjing since the author's family used to weave Yunjin for the King. That's how the story of the family became the prototype for the novel. |
The silk brocade production follows a process old more than 1500 years, used for weaving the cloth of the Emperor. Inside the museum you can see the real weaving process of this precious brocade.
The silk production in China is an incredibly ancient activity, but difficult to preserve: silk contains much more proteins after long time under the earth, once dug out by people will oxidate and faint. We have some pieces of silk fabric that dates back 2000 years, they've already become like pouder. This is the reason why our Institute tries to replicate these garments by studing how they where and reproducing the original clothes. From the original pictures of the dresses woven in the past we replicate the cloth's features (weight and transparency) and patterns. READ THE WHOLE INTERVIEW |
Lu Ban
Lu Ban was a Chinese carpenter, engineer, philosopher and inventor, born in the state of Lu and, after the Han Dynasty, Lu Ban was honored as the ancestor of carpenters and the God of Protection in the industry.His original name was Gongshu Yizhi (公輸依智). He was also known as Gongshu Ban (公輸班), Kungshu Pen (公輸般) and Kungshu Pun (公輸盘). But he was more commonly known as Lu Ban.
According to the tradition, he was responsible for several inventions:
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lu_Ban |
Spin Studio Ceramics
Spin ceramics is a small but impressive company that is bridging the gap between luxury and democratic, commercial and domestic design.
Started in 2004 as a brainwave by the interior designer, Gary Wang, like all good ideas, it started small and sensible – so sensible in fact it seemed laughably obvious: to turn existing expertise into good design. The china industry that gave China its name had fallen into decline, |
despite having such an esteemed heritage. Wang, with a small factory in the Jingdezhen province (the original heart of China’s china production), kick-started ceramics for a contemporary market, stripping away the gaud and putting function and simplicity back in the kiln.
Wang looked to the many universities in Shanghai, Beijing and Jingdezhen that still taught ceramics to find his small team of designers and encouraged them to experiment, with form, technique and glaze – all the while keeping simplicity and function to the fore. Just four years later and Spin has three showrooms, one each in Shanghai, Beijing and Melbourne and Spin tableware is now found across the length and breadth of China, in hotels, restaurants and, maybe more impressively, homes. Spin might still be a small company, but it is pioneering in its mission to update a traditional Chinese craft heritage and make it relevant and affordable for the masses. Source:http://www.wallpaper.com/design/spin-studio-ceramics-wujing-town/3389 |
FigTree International/Window of Yuanyang
"A social enterprise is set up not to maximize profits but to pursue specific social goals. It doesn't rely on fundings and donations while creating social benefits for those whose lives its touches. Unlike other companies, the surplus earned by social enterprise will be reinvested in the business to further benefit others."
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Window of Yuanyang is an organization affiliated to FigTree International and supported by World Vision China. The project encourages tribal women to produce handicrafts with traditional patterns. Purchasing their products helps to increase their incomes, self-confidence for improving their well-being, and preserve their indigenous traditional culture.
A friend of mine just came back from a trip around Yunnan with a little present for me and other friends, handmade by these beautiful women. http://windowofyuanyang.com/index.php?Introduction |
Design for development
Tikau works in close collaboration with the charity based NGO Tikau Share. Sustainability, human dignity and global solidarity are at the heart of the Tikau identity.
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Tikau is a Finnish company, which combines Scandinavian design and Indian handicraft traditions with the vision of employing and empowering the artisans of rural India. The word Tikau comes from Hindi and stands for sustainable and durable.
The collection consists of handmade home décor and clothing accessories for everyday wear. Their luxurious materials are hand processed and designed to be sustainable in terms of the environment, quality and aesthetics. Ecological considerations are at the root of our designs: local environmentally-friendly raw materials include bamboo, organic cotton, non-dyed wool, banana fiber, cashmere and recycled sari fabrics. Most of their products are non-dyed or use natural dyes and the use of hand-made processes minimizes energy consumption. Taking a uniquely long-term, personal and human approach, Tikau collaborates directly with its 120 artisans in their home villages in India, combining Scandinavian design skills and traditional craftsmanship. As each Tikau item is hand-made, each product expresses the unique and individual signature of the artisan who has made it. For more information check http://tikau.com/home.php?lang=en |
Tikau Light Collection
The Tikau Light Collection, created in collaboration with Tikau, IIkka Suppanen and an artisan community in rural Orissa, India, is a novel concept utilizing design to bring livelihood and aid to the unprivileged. It is a series of lamps that combines Finnish design knowledge with the handicraft skills of the Dalits living in an undeveloped rural village.
It's a very interesting and successful example of the union and collaboration between traditional handcrafts and the design world. It is also part of a bigger initiative carried out by Tikau Finnish Company |
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LuRu Home
Few days ago I got the chance to meet two wonderful young ladies living in SH and creating beautiful and simple products using blue Nankeen cloth.
These two American girls just started their business with a fresh collection of pillows, napkins, dish clothes, all using a traditional hand-made Chinese fabric that follows a 3000-year-old technique.
If you want to have a look to what they're doing, go to http://luruhome.com/
These two American girls just started their business with a fresh collection of pillows, napkins, dish clothes, all using a traditional hand-made Chinese fabric that follows a 3000-year-old technique.
If you want to have a look to what they're doing, go to http://luruhome.com/
How did everything start?
When we came to live here we started decorating our apartment, while doing it we chanced upon this fabric and kind of fell for it! It's similar to a lot of the colors that happen in design in the East Cost of America, lot of blue, very Nordic. It was kind of familiar foreign thing, familiar in the color palette, familiar in the feeling, plain cotton, very simple and we were really impressed with the range of patterns. It was very authentic! Moreover we were having this experience in China and trying to live it to its fullness so why not doing something for our apartment using this very unique Chinese cloth!? READ THE WHOLE INTERVIEW Liza and Claire with some of their Blue Nankeen Cloth products.
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Last year we moved to Shanghai,
And began to learn Chinese, A friend said, "Check out this neat shop," We shouted back, "Yes, please!" Down a little alleyway Our Nankeen fabric sat. Inside a musty, tiny store, We fell in love, that's that. Nankeen fabric is quite old, 3,000 years or more. It's been produced by hand, you see, Sits shrouded in folklore. An artisan first carves a screen And lays it down on cotton. He spreads a thick rice soybean paste, Then the pattern is stenciled on it. It dries ten days in shady breeze And then it gets a bath. Dipped seven times right in a row In seven indigo vats. A lengthy scrape, after it's dried Removes the crusty paste, Revealing crisp white patterns Suspended in blue space. And lastly, little LuRu Home Sews this fabric into wares, We send it onward to you all With so much love and care. |
About LU+RU interview
It's very interesting to learn the point of view and the experience of people already working with Chinese artisans to produce a new contemporary design while still using a very traditional and unique technique.
These two girls could certainly be the kind of people that a possible PSS should connect with the artisans. People who can find a new meaning for this kind of craftsmanship helping to keep alive and give value to the Intangible Cultural Heritage these people create everyday, sometimes without being aware of the importance that such a job has. A technique, a skill, a knowledge cannot be relegated inside a museum or inside a book, becoming a simple memory of the past. The core of the challenge is to keep it alive and working as it always has been: the meaning and the output might change adapting to the time and space |
in which such a skill is performed, but the values and the processes incorporated in it are untouched.
Something like the Blue Nankeen Cloth is a quite versatile case, fabric can be easily adapted, reinvented and shaped into new products, ever changing and always keeping the same heart, just like the fashion world teaches us everyday. But what about an artisan incredibly good in making woks out of iron just with manual labor? How can such an activity and amazing skill be kept and transformed to survive at the same time? What are the parameters that can help us to understand where to intervene, when something has to follow a more changeable path and reinvent itself to survive and express new meanings and when it just needs to remain the same, but communicate with different means in order to reach the right people using the right language? |
Getting started!
PRESERVATION OF THE ICH IN CHINESE CRAFTSMANSHIP
The research aims to find a possible solution to the matter of preservation and promotion of traditional Chinese craftsmen's skills and techniques together with the Cultural System surrounding them.
The topic that we selected for the 48-hour Jam, including the elaboration and solution that followed, were incredibly interesting and once this whole experience ended I felt like we were still missing something. |
The importance of the subject, the feasibility and simplicity of the solution made me think that it was definitely worth to keep working on it in order to develop a deeper and better defined project. That's how I asked my mates the permission (and blessing) to take Artisino project and, through a better understanding of the context and a more detailed research, shape it into the final thesis for my Master Degree.
The first step I took was to look at our project with a critical eye, try to find its strengths, weaknesses and understand how to change and improve it. |
The initial idea of Artisino was already highly feasible, especially thanks to the consistency of the matter we were trying to face. UNESCO defines “traditions or living expressions inherited from our ancestors and passed on to our descendants, such as,oral traditions,performing arts,,social practices, rituals, festive events,,knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe,or the,knowledge and skills to produce traditional crafts” as Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) with particular great attention on traditional craftsmanship. (for more information check out UNESCO website for Intangible Cultural Heritage http://www.unesco.org/culture/ich/index.php?pg=home, the explanation of what ICH is
http://www.unesco.org/culture/ich/index.php?lg=en&pg=00002, and in particular the definition of Traditional Craftsmanship
http://www.unesco.org/culture/ich/index.php?lg=en&pg=00057)
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While we take into account the craftsmanship as an important cultural heritage to keep alive the first step to take is to understand the priorities and define the real needs around the preservation issue. Many times people concentrate their attention on the final artifact, the last step of craftsmanship and therefore they think of protecting the craftsmanship knowledge through preserving the object itself. This is how we end up with museums and collections of beautiful objects that we can admire while reading a hardly fulfilling explanation on the side.
The final artifact is simply the ultimate expression of a whole process and technique performed by the artisan. It's this ability the real essence of craftsmanship, the empowering force leading to the final output and infusing it with such importance and meaning. This knowledge and techniques are a real treasure that needs to be preserved while questioning ourselves how to keep it alive and functional in an ever-changing reality like the one we live in. |
IMG 1_General Cultural System around Craftsmanship.
When a craftsman is performing a job he's putting into practice his knowledge, techniques and skills, finally translating them into a high-quality artifacts ready to use. The performance of his job it's the physical manifestation of his knowledge directly affecting his surroundings and generating a whole Social & Cultural System, the preservation of the above-named activity would not just affect the preservation of a ICH, but of the traditional and sustainable Cultural System depending on it. Therefore a virtuous circle is enhanced in which the artifact depends |
on the activity that creates it and at the same time sustains the activity itself through the product's demand. The Social and Cultural System is the one providing the demand and depending on the performance of the craftsman as part of the community life and identity. In the moment the artifact is not required any more, the activity performed to create it looses its meaning and it stops existing compromising the whole system around it.
IMG 2 and 3_Sustainable System with Craftsmanship as Territorial Capital at the core of it. |
Wrapping up
See all the groups that took part to the event and the projects that came out after just a week-end together. You can see the results of the Global Service Jam from all over the world here
http://planet.globalservicejam.org/gsj12/projects
gsj_report_2012_shanghai.pdf | |
File Size: | 3350 kb |
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ArtiSino
After 2 days of work and research we presented our project together with all the other Jammers. ARTISINO’s goal is to create a mobile/online directory of Shanghai’s artisans, provide relevant information for locating and understanding them, promote their work and help establish quality standards of local hand-made goods and art products.
One can easily buy a plastic stool for RMB20, but if you buy an artisan’s work, you can be assured that his wood chair will be passed on to your children, and then to their own children. |
Of course, there is room for mass-produced furniture, but without artisans we will soon live in a world much poorer.
Artisans are an important part of Chinese society and culture, they are an essential element of social harmony. ARTISINO plans to make sure of that: we will look for those hidden treasures, for those diamonds in the rough. We will dig through the mud for those lost pearls. |
sdj_artisino_02_26_2012.pdf | |
File Size: | 1971 kb |
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Meeting the Artisans...Our case study is a Chinese carpenter working in the streets of SH. Despite his skills and the uniqueness of his job, he's not proud of it and doesn't want to pass it along! This guy used to produce fine wooden birdcages, different pieces of furniture and miniature objects, but along time his work lost importance and now he's just producing plain-wood stools.
We are glad to introduce you to Mr. Little Carpenter and his works http://vimeo.com/37931189 |
Mad ChickensThis year theme was HIDDEN TREASURE. Among the different ideas that came out around the topic, six Jammers especially liked one: hidden treasure like all the skilled craftsmen hidden around the city...difficult to find and extremely precious. We gathered around our leader Ariel and the Mad Chickens started scratching around!
Group members: Ariel Natalie Erica Giulia TianWei WangQian SongQing |
This year the Global Service gathered around 2060 jammers in 85 cities who designed 350 brand new services in just 48 hours.
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Everything started with a Jam...A bit more than one month ago I took part in the Service Design Jam together with few other friends. I was expecting it to be a normal workshop like any other, but I found something more: the enthusiasm, the openness and co-operation together with the friendly competition between people coming from completely different backgrounds who don't know each other at all!
All of this to create in 48 hours a brand new service inspired by a theme shared by everyone around the globe...a quite special experience I must say. But what is a Jam?! "Imagine a Jam session in music. You come together, bringing your instruments, your skills, your open mind. Someone sets up a theme, and you start to Jam around it. You don't overanalyse it, you don't discuss it to death, you Jam. You bounce your ideas off other people, and play around with what comes back. Together, you build something which none of you could have built alone. And at the same time, you are learning new ideas, discovering more about how you work and whom you best work with, sharpening your skills, and having a great time. And who knows, maybe there are one or two ideas there which might make it to the next album. Or maybe you Jammed so well, you decide to form a band... The Global Service Jam works in just the same way. But it's not music you are Jamming - it's ideas. Working with people you might never have met before, bouncing ideas off one another and building on what bounces back. And it's not just talking - you can turn your ideas into a concrete design, prototype and plan of action which you or somebody else might want to make real. Can you prototype and plan it in a way that someone could go out and make it real, knowing what resources they would need, what they should do, and who they should talk to? That's the challenge of the Jam." |