Today (June 12) is China Cultural Heritage Day. As a national intangible cultural heritage, bamboo weaving has been circulating in the land of China for thousands of years. On the occasion of the centenary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, Song Rongsheng, a bamboo weaver in Chongming, Shanghai, is sending his blessings in an ancient way.
Walking into Song Rongsheng's house, there were moso bamboo scattered in the hall, and he was sitting on the bench fiddling with these bamboo grates. Judging from his many years of experience, to make a fruit plate, an inch of moso bamboo needs to be repeatedly divided into 12 bamboo baskets. A few millimeters thick bamboo grates are layered, polished and scraped with swords and knives to become satin smooth bamboo wire that can be woven.
Last year, Song Rongsheng was invited by the preparatory group of the Flower Expo to start weaving bamboo baskets for the South Garden of the Flower Expo, which was displayed to the public and tourists as a business card of Chongming Cultural Tourism. In May this year, in order to celebrate the smooth holding of the Flower Expo and the centenary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, Song Rongsheng completed the weaving of six fruit plates in one month. These six fruit plates have three patterns, namely "Blossoming Chinese Dream", "Blossoming Chongming" and "Centennial Party Building". The red bamboo grates are dyed in advance, and the overall design of the pattern is on his own, amazingly, he never drafts, all the pattern weaving is formed in advance in the mind, accurate to the longitude and latitude and millimeter.
For 75-year-old Song Rongsheng, bamboo weaving is not "intangible cultural heritage", but life. After graduating from school 60 years ago, he began to teach himself the art of imitating the way his neighbor weaved bamboo grates. The old man has gone, things are not people, and he is the only one in the Xingjiao village today who is still inheriting this skill at his fingertips. After retirement, dealing with bamboo became his habit. "Fine knitting takes three days, while ordinary knitting takes a day and a half." Song Rongsheng admits that his life is calculated by bamboo weaving, and the time spent with bamboo is calm and comfortable.
Since the opening of the Flower Expo, Song Rongsheng has not entered the Flower Expo Garden. Immediately, he will go to the Flower Expo Garden with his wife to see his own works in the exhibition garden and see how lively the flowers in Chongming are.
Reporter: Liu Liming
Photo: Fang Tianyang
Editor: Gu Jiali