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| Arts & Crafts |
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Pictures
carved to resemble photos are a new type of stone carving
in Hui'an.
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Hui'an Stone Carving Hui'an, a city on the coast of Fujian,
is known as the "home of stone carving". Legend has it that
in the early Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) when troops were fighting
in this area, some of the men who came from Anhui's Shouxian
County and excelled in quarrying and stone carving decided to
settle down in Hui'an and resume their old profession. During
the Yongle reign (1403-1424) of the Ming Dynasty, stone carving
workshops began to appear in the region. They produced mainly
architectural decorations, and these decorative carvings made
their way to many temples and monasteries in Fujian and Taiwan,
as well as some of Beijing's grandest buildings.
Hui'an's stone carvings have seen many developments over the
years, and now number some 130 varieties which can be divided
into three categories: stone tablets, stone products for ornamental
use and stone products for daily use. In 1970 a new type of
stone art was created which involved highly detailed carvings
that are exact copies of photos or paintings, meticulously done
on a flat piece of stone. |
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