The Vitality Of Handicaft:An Anthropological Study On The Course Of Jianshui Purple Pottery Industry

Jianshui Pottery,which refers to all the pottery products from Jianshui County of Yunnan,both historically and nowadays.Basically,it covers two types including the pottery implements and the ceramic artwork,and the latter was usually called the Purple Pottery.Purple Pottery is a kind of ceramics blended with the craft of painting and calligraphy,carving and filling,firing and burnishing.Studies on this topic are previously focused on the field of Arts,in particularly with the artistic quality as implements.Discussion are usually on its origin and history,technology and craft,shapes and patterns,and styles of decoration.Holding this narrow perspective makes it mostly highlights on things and arts as they were there,while being deficient to the study on the people behind,like who produce and consume,and the course of pottery industry,neither on the analyses of economic,political,cultural and social factors involved with from the beginning to the development of Jianshui Purple Pottery.That brings the intention for doing this research.In the perspective of the Anthropology of Things,this dissertation studies the Jianshui Purple Pottery Indusry and Craft Cultrue through the fieldwork.It considers crucial factors and cause for how its lifecycle changed,thus search the impetus for its carrying on and being creative,which happens all the time for the persistence of traditional handicraft.According to its developing history,it falls into four periods of Jianshui Purple Pottery's production courses,that is called 1)germinate stage,2)designing stage,3)winding stage,and 4)contemporary stage.In every stage,the pottery industry and crafts was shaped in the same frame of history of economy,politics,culture and society.Thus it brings a new perspective of doing research.The throwing and firing skills emerged from the process of earthenware and stoneware.During Qing Dynasty and Minguo Period,people who specialized on painting and calligraphy created their work on the surface of green body,accumulated and finalized the painting and calligraphy designing art.Meanwhile,it turned out that the nature of it changed from a daily necessity to an artwork.With interaction between the craftsmen and the literati,Purple Pottery's technology and design are settled and being more sophisticated.From 1949 to 1979 and even after,Jianshui Purple Pottery were generally produced from Jianshui Arts and Crafts Ceramics Factory,with a strong intent of politics and economy.Besides some particular delicate ceramics for export,most products are for popularity.Therefore,purple pottery,which were boutique ceramics,turned into available domestic vessels and artworks.Step into year 2000,its fabrication has been separated into workshops,studios and companies.Along with the intensified social transition,the vast group of consumers and diverse group of producers bring up variety of the pottery design,that household necessities and handicrafts are both available,and all expressed their chasing on the 'cultural pottery'.The concept of cultural pottery and its relevant fabrication are based on the old industry of purple pottery.With the thought that painting and calligraphy means culture,it forms the binary opposition of cultural and technical differentiations.However,with the influence of composite integrity cultural view,and the change of casting craftsmen's social status and identity,technology and art turns its attribute from non-cultural to cultural.It thinks that it is the principal of binary difference caused the fabricant groups built a field of purple pottery production,which is involved with politics,economy and culture.In periods of time,different producers shape and turn down this field,and compete with each other on technical capital,cultural capital,symbolic capital and social capital,thus make the pottery craft carried on and recreate.The designing and decorative style change gradually with time flies.In the process,it looks that the social identity of craftsmen is flowing,depends on the periods who begins one's career.It thinks that the symbolization of Jianshui purple pottery nowadays happened crucially though the binary principal,also by the formation,operation and evolution of this pottery field.It gives dynamic to the designing's extension and recreation.That explanation around this matter is considered the advance of this study.Applied the path of social life research and the field theory,it would be more helpful to analyze and understand the reason of Jianshui purple pottery's persistence.No matter the increase of craftsmen's throwing skill or the advancement of literati's cultivation,it must benefit from the open and healthy operation of the pottery field,and the diversity of fabricant individuals.That even make sense to the traditional handicrafts vitality.