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Exquisite skills on show at craft exhibit
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CENTURY-OLD iron tea kettles, traditional pastry molds and vintage suitcases are on display at the Crafts Museum of China Academy of Art in Hangzhou. The exhibits showcase the beauty of ordinary utensils widely used by the Chinese people just a century ago.
The Exhibition of Chinese Traditional Crafts and Utensils is co-sponsored by the museum and Jin Ze Art Center in Shanghai, and runs until July 23.
“To showcase crafts is what our museum does,” said Hang Jian, the director of the museum. “They record the history of people’s life.”
The first floor has iron kettle exhibits from Jincheng, Shanxi Province.
Traditionally, southeastern Zelu area in Shanxi Province is the country’s center of iron smelting. Jincheng is known for its iron mines and is a gathering place of blacksmiths. The industry was so developed in this area that many of the roads and streets were named after famous blacksmiths.
In south and east China, pottery teapots were widely used, while in Shanxi iron tea kettles were once very popular and were even imported to Japan and Nepal centuries ago.
This exhibition showcases over 80 pieces of Jincheng iron kettles, as well as some boilers and stoves produced in the last century. The largest kettle has a 56-centimeter body and was used to serve lots of people in teahouses. Most of them are of average size.
Shanxi iron kettles rarely have patterns, but are featured by its slender handle and heavy body. Unlike modern stainless-steel containers, those old-timers are rough, heavy and black.
None of the iron kettles are the same as they were all handmade. The process involved two blacksmiths finishing 70-plus procedures — from smelting and molding to cooling and polishing.
On the second floor, wood replaces iron. Chinese cake molds collected from north and south China highlight how ancient people in the country enriched their cuisine culture with cakes of sweet, salty, and spicy flavor.
Not every cake needs a mold. The Suzhou-style mooncake with flaky puff pastry crust is directly toasted from a paste. But the Cantonese style’s thin, patterned, glossy crust is molded before being sent into ovens.
A mold decides cake’s shape and pattern. Round or square were too common. But the exhibition has shapes of human, animal and flowers on display.
Ancient Chinese people embodied lots of wishes into the cakes. Fruits and plants were used because of their metaphoric meanings. Grapefruit was used to wish children in the family; bamboo to wish longevity or promotion; while peony represented fortune.
Besides, animal-shape cakes were used for sacrifices as an alternative to real animals. Gradually it was a common thing to see on the tables.
Characters are used a lot on round or square cakes. For wedding, there was Xi cake (xi means happiness in wedding); for business they used huangjin wanliang — meaning lots of gold; and for birthday changming baisui — meaning long life.
Other times, character, flower, fruit, and animal were combined.
“Every pattern means, and it must mean good things,” said Wu Guangrong, deputy professor of pottery, arts and crafts at China Academy of Art.
“But a cake of same pattern and shape can have different stuffing, depending on who makes it,” he added. “Yunnan people use roses, eastern people prefer sweetened bean paste, and northern people go with sesame.”
On the third floor are old cases made of leather, rattan, wood, bamboo and iron sheet.
The hundreds of cases include small ones used for snacks, large ones and special ones for clocks, instrument, cosmetics, opium pipes or medicines.
“They are not exactly antiques or luxuries, but they are good designs and exquisite handicrafts. And they are very practical,” said Jin Xiaoyi, deputy director of the museum.
As an example Jin points to the palm-fiber-weaved cases.
“Invented over two centuries ago, the case is durable, damp-proof, rodent-resistant and insect-resistant. Its natural color is fast. And it neither sheds hair nor mildews.”
Jin urged visitors to pay attention to the metal handles and buckles because those are all hand-made and glitter with the gloss of time.
Date: Through July 23, 10am-4pm, closed on Mondays
Address: 352 Xiangshan Rd,
Zhuantang Town
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