Bright and dark harmony in the collection of Chinese folk paper-cut patterns
Mingxue is a homophonic method that directly uses the harmonious pronunciation to get the meaning. In folk paper-cutting, auspicious pattern names are often used to directly confirm it, such as fish is homophonic to "yu", lotus is homophonic to "lian", seed is homophonic to "zi", chicken is homophonic to "auspicious"... There are many examples of this kind of "homonym" in folk paper-cutting. There are many examples, and they appear in large numbers in paper-cuttings related to reproduction and heirs, love and marriage, blessings and auspiciousness. It should be pointed out that these "homonymic" images have a perfect internal connection with the literal meaning, such as "Lian (lotus) has more than one year (fish)", "Durian opens a hundred seeds (seeds)", "Muro Shang Daji (chicken)", "His Shang" "Mei (plum) tip" etc. (For the application of homophony in traditional Chinese folk paper-cutting, please refer to: Homophony in Traditional Chinese Folk Paper-cutting).
Among these visual objects, fish - symbolizes abundance, chicken - symbolizes good fortune, pomegranate - symbolizes the Confucian scholar with a thousand sons, magpie - symbolizes festive things, the image and homophony, the image and the meaning are cleverly combined. Harmony and complement each other, the picture expression is very clear, and ordinary people can see it at a glance. This creation of collective consciousness gradually formed a fixed formula under the linear inheritance of local culture. It became a substitute for a certain concept in the minds of ordinary people, expressing their common value scale and aesthetic taste. It has been among the people for a long time. It has been spread and used for a long time.
Another way of "homonym" is hidden homophony, which is a method of homophony that cannot directly use the harmonious pronunciation to get the meaning. People must first decipher the homophonic things and things before they can find its homophony. location. The object images and homophones in this collection of paper-cut patterns only come from the auspicious meaning of "asking for oral color".Starting from the proverbs and auspicious sayings, there is not much connection between the pictures and their meanings, and some are even far-fetched. For example, the pattern of "side by side lotus and one lotus root" is called "connecting (lotus) into a pair (lotus root)", "immediately" "Feng (bee) Hou (monkey)", "Ji (halberd) Qing (chime) Ruyi", "耄(cat)耄(butterfly) wealth", etc. These homophonic sounds are more written, and there is a gap between the picture and the meaning. The contact is relatively distant. For example, "Old man is rich and noble" originally comes from the "Book of Rites". The "Book of Rites" says, "A seventy-year-old is called an old man, and an eighty-year-old is called an old man." This method is often used by citizens and even literati and officials.
"With the changes in history, in the minds of modern people, 'Hou' and 'Monkey', 'Ji' and 'Ji', 'Qing' and 'Qing' and '耋' and 'die', It seems that the inner connection can no longer be found, and it is gradually forgotten by the people or no longer used, and is only collected and studied by a few folk art experts as auspicious patterns." (Promoted reading: Symbolic shapes and related literary techniques in Chinese folk paper-cutting)
