Common themes of Chinese folk paper-cutting

Folk paper-cutting has a wide range of themes, mostly based on celebrities and folklore. , which shows common things in peoples real life and expresses their desire for a better life.

It can be roughly divided into the following categories:

1. Real life themes. Most of the creators of traditional folk paper-cutting in my country come from rural housewives. Therefore, most of their paper-cutting themes come from the actual life scenes around them. Based on themes from life, the content of the paper-cut works created also has a strong and simple flavor of life. For example, feeding chickens and pigs, herding cows and sheep, riding donkeys and driving carts, participating in labor and doing family side jobs, or directly using poultry and livestock as themes, such as chickens, ducks, cows, horses, sheep, camels, cats and dogs, etc., and also depicting common plants and flowers in life. Various fruits, vegetables, etc.

2 The theme of auspicious meaning, such as "Ma Gu Xian Shou" used in birthday celebrations, It means having both hands. "The Old Man Under the Moon" implies that marriage is a beautiful marriage given by God. When expressing these meanings, the field uses the harmonious method, the homophonic method, and the symbolic method to convey it.

Harmony method uses things or features that can represent a certain image or scene to express it. For example, if a fish is cut out, it means a lake or river. It means that the sky can be cut into a cloud or a bird. This is a simplified expression technique. The homophonic method uses sound-picture representation techniques. For example, cutting and carving flowers on a rooster means that it is a flowered rooster. "Continuous Years of Prosperity" means cutting and carving lotus, which sounds like "lian", and carp, which sounds like "yu". Symbolism uses a certain object to represent a certain concept, and makes people associate it based on a certain connection between things. For example, the pomegranate symbolizes many children and grandchildren, the peach symbolizes longevity, and the pine tree symbolizes evergreen, etc.

3 Opera characters and legendary story themes, especially Peking Opera facial makeup. In ancient times, folk myths and legends were spread throughout the country through drama and other art forms. People expressed their understanding of these stories through paper-cutting while reciting them. For example, Yue Opera is popular in Jiangsu and Zhejiang. Most of the local opera characters and legendary themes are based on the plots of popular local legends such as "A Dream of Red Mansions", "The Legend of the White Snake", "Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai", and "The Legend of the New White Snake". Yu County, which is close to Beijing, the birthplace of Peking Opera, is most famous for its Peking Opera facial makeup. In addition, folk legends and stories such as "Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea", "Houyi Shoots the Sun", "Chang'e Flying to the Moon", "The Goddess Scattering Flowers" are often themes expressed in paper-cut works.