Seal carving is beloved by a relatively small group of connoisseurs. But Wang Jie shows how it creates small jewels from calligraphy, carving and stone.

Collectors have rarely given seal carving the type of recognition garnered by other traditional Chinese art forms like ink-wash painting and calligraphy.

For much of history, a relatively small group of people including the artists themselves and some specialized collectors appreciated the true beauty created by a knife on a small piece of stone or other material.

It is a tiny world often less than five centimeters square.

Seal carving, also known as seal cutting or zhuanke (篆刻) in Chinese, is an ancient form of art that originated in China and later spread to East Asia.

It refers to cutting a pattern into the bottom face of the seal — the active surface, used for stamping — rather than the sides or top, which sometimes are also elaborately carved. Seal carving represents the ancient skills of carving and calligraphy, as well as creation of a unique “signature.”

Seals appeared during the Shang (16th century-11th century BC) and Zhou (11th century-256 BC) dynasties, according to the Shanghai Museum, which opened the first gallery specifically devoted to displaying Chinese seals.

The function of ancient seals might have been related to official workmanship and inscription. Because seals at that time were mainly used in government and by nobles and officials, the style of seals was very formal and beautiful.

Over the past few years, some rare, historic seals have been snapped up for increasingly large sums of money.

But for 67-year-old Lu Kang, seal carving is much more than that — it is not only his career but also a “silent tiny world” where he can indulge his own aesthetic tastes.

Art that can draw blood

Lu grew up in a traditional intellectual family in Shanghai. His grandfather, Lu Dai’an, was a famous sinology master with a profound knowledge of calligraphy, poetry and seal carving.

“For no particular reason, I was fascinated by seal carving when I was a little child, so I asked my grandfather to find someone to teach me,” he recalls. “At that time, the heavyweight names in Chinese modern history such as Chen Shifa and Liu Danzhai in old Shanghai were all his friends. Luckily, I had priority in choosing my favorite teacher.”

Chen Julai (1904-84), one of the top masters of seal carving at the time, became Lu’s teacher. Lu says he “preferred his style.”

“Unlike calligraphy or ink-wash painting, seal carving is an art form that might get you wounded,” he says. “It requires full concentration on a tiny space. Any mistake or a moment of absent-mindedness could lead to a bleeding finger.”

But Lu got better with practice day after day and year after year, and he learned how to manipulate the knife on different stones with different textures.

“Today not so many Chinese people are familiar with the history of seal carving and how to appreciate a top quality seal,” Lu says. “But that has been common during the art’s development in the past centuries.”

While it is now not unknown for high-quality seals to reach prices of several million yuan, it is the historic seals of emperors that have recently reached stratospheric prices.

In 2003, the largest seal ever used by an emperor of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) that had been retrieved from overseas sold for 6 million yuan (US$726,000) at an auction in Beijing, according to Xinhua news agency.

The seal, with a surface of 9.5 centimeters square, is said to have been used by the Emperor Kangxi (1654–1722), the fourth emperor of the Qing Dynasty, and hit a record high at the time for the auction of an imperial seal.

However, even higher records were set by the Imperial Qianlong Jade Seal created in 1796 to mark the abdication of Emperor Qianlong (1711-1799), the sixth Qing emperor.

In 2007, the seal was sold for US$5.92 million at an Sotheby’s auction in Hong Kong to a Chinese collector.

However, in April 2010, the seal was sold for more than double that amount, US$12.3 million, at Sotheby’s, Hong Kong. This set a new world record price at auction for both a jade item and any imperial seal.

Soapstone from Zhejiang

Seals came into wider use during the Song Dynasty (960-1279), when scholar-artists flourished, and seal making became popular.

Since that era, soapstone has been widely used in seal cutting. Stones from Qingtian in Zhejiang Province, called Qingtian seal-stone (青田印石) and soapstone named Shoushan seal-stone (寿山印石) from Fujian Province, were widely used.

Expert artisans created numerous carving styles. Also during this period, seals started being used as signatures on paintings and works of calligraphy.

By the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368), seal carving had become a very developed art. The Ming (1368-1644) and Qing dynasties were the golden period for the ancient art. In the Qing Dynasty, soapstone from Inner Mongolia named Balin seal-stone (巴林印石) was often used.

Rare stone used for seals has become so highly prized that the raw material alone can fetch up to 1 million yuan.

As Chinese architecture developed, seals also were developed for use with building materials. After finishing a tile or a brick, the maker normally stamped his seal on the surface. Such seals, besides indicating the maker’s name and time or place, were also done in different styles reflecting the maker’s personal characteristics.

Seal makers not only had to possess carving skills. Their memories were tested by “a sea of carving characters” in different styles, Lu says.

“Seal carving is similar to mirror-writing, not to mention each word has several fixed carving styles,” he notes, adding that at the beginning, he had to refer to carving books to decipher each word.

In the Shang Dynasty, the oracle bone script was used for seals, and during the Zhou period, while various scripts were used because Chinese characters were still not standardized, the da zhuan (大篆) or jing wen (金文) styles were mainly used.

In the Qin Dynasty (221-207 BC), the more regular seal script called xiao zhuan (小篆) was given the formal blessing of Chancellor Li Si and proclaimed by the Emperor Qinshihuang, unifying the written script of Chinese characters for the first time.

“Certainly today I don’t need to refer to the books of how to write these characters, as they have already been carved in my mind,” Lu says. “The difficult part in seal carving lies in the styles of the carving characters being fixed. You can’t add more or delete a single curve. You also have to distinguish your own style, how each existing curve goes really counts on one’s experience and field of vision.”

Lu says his abilities also were expanded by his overseas exposure.

Cultural ambassador

Lu moved to Macau in the 1980s and served as cultural ambassador of Macau’s government for 17 years.

“Every year I traveled widely in Europe with Miss Macau to promote the city image,” he says. “I showed the Westerners traditional Chinese seal carving and calligraphy. I was often asked to write the Chinese characters for them. What impressed me the most is that what they wanted me to write was always ‘I love you,’ ‘you love me,’ ‘peace’ or ‘maternal love,’ never ever traditional words like ‘happy and prosperous’.”

Lu says these experiences opened his eyes toward a different world and life, which affected his creation.

“Sometimes I would refer to the Western way of tableau arrangement,” he says. “Never think seal carving is to simply carve several characters on a chop. The subtlety in balancing each character in harmony, with elegance and beauty, is a real challenge. I would compare it to the mix-and-match fashion style. How you select a match of different characters in different styles tests a person’s aesthetic taste, imagination and creativity.”

Lu now lives in Shanghai’s Gubei area, full of antique furniture he has collected, where he can escape to his “tiny world” after his frequent trips to Macau.

“I prefer to collect the furniture of the Republic of China (1912-1949) because it is a fusion with Western elegant style,” he says. “Actually I don’t see the investment value of the furniture, but the aesthetic taste hidden in it.”

Lu is no hermit — every evening, he enjoys his wide social web. Lu also calls himself a gourmand.

Many friends, including officials, business executives and celebrities ask him to carve a special seal for them.

He says, smiling, that there is “only one day a year that I am not invited to dine out with my friends — Valentine’s Day.”

Lu never married.

“I just haven’t met the right person who could lead me to marriage,” he says.

Because his eyesight has declined and pain in his neck and back, Lu can no longer spend a long time sitting with his seal carving. But he still picks up his knife and stone every day.

“When I am carving, I can immediately calm myself down. I feel that I am akin to a conservator of Chinese characters,” he says.