love for the country and family·it’s time to strive丨she will bring 30 sets of "most chinese" dresses to shine at paris fashion week!
2024-09-09
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how to bring the essence of traditional costumes
incorporating modern aesthetics
the image that best represents chinahow to use oriental aestheticstoday, we are increasingly moving to the center of the world stagebuild a theoretical and practicalacademy of fine arts, tsinghua universityprofessor li wei from the dyeing and weaving departmenti have been pursuing this path diligently
let oriental aesthetics shine on the world stage
national costume designed by li wei
in the 1980s, china's fashion industry was just beginning. at that time, li wei, who had loved art since childhood, was in her prime. "i studied in a painting class in northeast china for three years and finally got into the central academy of arts and crafts (now the academy of fine arts, tsinghua university) as i wished, becoming the first undergraduate student in the fashion major," li wei said."under the influence of wu guanzhong and other older art masters, i have a deeper understanding of artistic creation and have strengthened my belief in 'serving the country with art'."li wei (second row, second from right) and teachers and students from the central academy of arts and designsince college, li wei has been committed to exploring and expressing chinese culture and its representative elements.in 1985, the famous french designer yves saint laurent held a retrospective of yves saint laurent fashion at the national art museum of china. li wei, a junior, had the honor of participating in the exhibition, and the experience left a deep impression on her: "as a beginner, i was very excited to have the opportunity to get close to design works from the fashion capital of paris."this experience broadened li wei's horizons and gave her a bold idea:why can’t we create our own “luxury goods”, integrate traditional chinese culture into clothing design, and bring oriental aesthetics to the world stage?"rooted in traditional culture and using intangible cultural heritage handicrafts as a medium." for many years, li wei has been focusing on innovative practical research in international fashion design and global contemporary art. through a unique oriental poetic perspective, she has created fashion art and fiber art works with a new "oriental vision" aura.in li wei's opinion,the five virtues of traditional chinese culture, namely benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom and trustworthiness, can be externalized through etiquette-appropriate clothing. the cultural confidence of the new era also needs to be reflected in new clothing with chinese style.
“it is my duty to take responsibility for the image of the country.”
when you are required to wear formal attire to attend certain occasions, what kind of clothing is both in line with etiquette and can showcase oriental aesthetics?this is the question that li wei has been thinking about.
two years ago, when li wei saw two mysterious song dynasty cultural relics, a blue brocade with deer pattern and a gauze skirt with phoenix and magpie pattern, at the china national silk museum, she seemed to have found the answer.
li wei cooperated with the china silk museum and a number of national intangible cultural heritage handicraft inheritors to reproduce the two cultural relics step by step through traditional weaving, dyeing and embroidery techniques, and made innovative design transformations of china's traditional intangible cultural heritage fabrics brocade, gauze and gauze, "revitalizing" the cultural relics, integrating the essence of traditional costumes into modern aesthetics, and using modern concepts and methods to design national ceremonial costumes that combine traditional charm and contemporary style, creating a new image of national costumes.
li wei (left) worked with craftsmen to overcome technical difficulties and carefully create a vivid and beautiful handmade dressas soon as li wei's new works were released, they were well received by people at home and abroad.this time, the national costume with the theme of "song dynasty charm" is no exception. when seeing the exquisite traditional materials such as song dynasty brocade, luo, and xiao, foreign friends have repeatedly paid a lot of money to buy them.all of these were rejected by li wei. she said:"there are many people who make clothes and do marketing, but few people study the chinese national costume. this is related to the image of the country, and i have no choice but to do my part!"li wei is a straightforward artist who likes to travel and explore the world with her feet and observe beauty with her eyes. she is immersed in her own unique artistic world, making friends with embroiderers, villagers, craftsmen, and inheritors of intangible cultural heritage, and obtaining endless creative inspiration from nature and various ethnic cultures.li wei went to ethnic minority areas to collect folk songsat the same time, li wei is also a pure scholar.for more than forty years, she has been reading, studying and doing research.in order to build a national costume system, li wei did a lot of research work. she wrote monographs such as "complete collection of chinese arts and crafts·national volume·skills volume·embroidery, drawnwork, knitting, and costumes and props", "research on peking opera costume making techniques", "embroiderer", and "illustrated guide to chinese traditional costumes", and published more than 20 papers in core journals such as "a preliminary study on the embroidery craftsmanship of liangshan yi costumes".in march 2024, the “dresser·heaven and earth” li wei high-end fashion show was held the picture shows the three series of "dyeing, embroidery and brocade" in this fashion showfrom 1995 to 2005, li wei was invited to hold solo exhibitions in france four times.the french media highly praised it:"li wei's thoughts and feelings may help us find a way to make chinese fashion eventually become an important part of the world's clothing trends.”
at the "sight and sound - li wei art exhibition" held at the biella city art center in june 2013, the media praised the exhibition: "her works are based on the international level, combining traditional oriental beauty with art and fiber"; "her clothing works are very light, and the subtle colors are almost imperceptible, which is quite exquisite."li wei's work "new chinese clothing" was permanently collected by the victoria and albert museum in the uk and exhibited as a permanent exhibitioncreating a national costume is an artistic innovation from “0 to 1”, which requires a lot of manpower and material resources.it’s a road few people choose, but li wei enjoys it.“some people will take the road of quick success and instant benefits, but more people need to take the road of long-term success."she said," the design and production of the national costume is just the beginning.in the future, i hope to design more clothing for the country that is both ceremonial and can demonstrate cultural confidence.”
traditional intangible cultural heritage × digital technology = infinite new possibilities
"the roots of intangible cultural heritage are in the countryside. intangible cultural heritage can only be vital if it grows in the countryside."over the years, li wei has been going to the grassroots level to conduct field surveys in ethnic minority areas to personally experience rural life and the living conditions of intangible cultural heritage inheritors and craftsmen.in the process of designing and producing the national costume, li wei insisted on hand-making the entire process.she climbed mountains and crossed ridges with huang ronghua, the inheritor of plant dyeing, to obtain the "essence of heaven and earth" natural dyeing thread; in the taihu courtyard in suzhou, she and li dexi, the master of silk weaving skills in jiangsu province, rescued, restored and reproduced the hand-woven weaving in the song dynasty; she visited liang xuefang, the inheritor of suzhou embroidery, to discuss embroidery on perforated gauze, showing rich rhythmic changes in shape, density, virtuality and reality...
in shaoxing zihong ancient village, li wei (right) and huang ronghua, inheritor of plant dyeing, climbed mountains and crossed ridges to extract the essence of heaven and earth and use natural dyeing threadfrom a silk thread to a garment, it took more than three months for li wei and traditional craftsmen to complete the production of the "song yun" themed national costume.with the help of digital technology, these clothes have broken through the boundaries of reality and virtuality, dynamically walking on the virtual catwalk in the form of digital dresses, shining brightly.in march 2023, five sets of "song yun" digital fashion works designed by li wei met with the audience at the song yun cultural innovation artworks invitational exhibition, and completed the dynamic catwalk of the works. this series of works has been permanently collected as the first batch of digital collections of the china national silk museum.she hopes that in the exploration of designing and making national costumes, she can encourage craftsmen in various links such as dyeing, weaving and embroidery to participate, so that traditional intangible cultural heritage can be revitalized.li wei (first from left) and li dexi, a master of silk weaving in jiangsu province, and his wife are weaving with great carerecently, li wei has just returned from yushu tibetan autonomous prefecture in qinghai province. regardless of the hardships of the long journey, the 60-year-old woman went back to her studio to work, drawing, buying cloth, dyeing, making samples... she gradually used the yak wool and sanjiangyuan elements she got from yushu to design national costumes, preparing for the closing show of beijing international fashion week on september 17.on september 24, li wei will also present her works at the paris fashion week.by then, she will integrate china's beautiful landscape and ethnic characteristics into traditional fabrics with unique designs, and use intangible cultural heritage crafts to make 30 sets of "most chinese" dresses. li wei is confident that once the dresses with rich chinese heritage are unveiled in paris, they will attract the attention of this fashion capital and even the world.
source: tsinghua university
editor/zhao rui
review/mingfang
producer/qiao hong
