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Animal-mask patterned cong (long hollow piece of jade) of the Liangzhu Culture, 8.8cm high, about 6,500g in weight

Jade has been cherished by the Chinese as a symbol of man virtues. Its hardness suggests firmness and loyalty, and its luster projects purity and beauty. Typical subjects are carvings of flowers, animals, vases, and human figures.
In the Neolithic Age, when people gradually recognized colored stone similar to jade in choosing stone for making implements, they used such stone to make implements, ornaments and sacrificial offerings. The colored stone turned items can be called the embryonic form of jade artworks, which can be traced back to the Hemudu Culture in China. By the middle and late yeas of the Neolithic Age, jade-carving had been detached from stone ware making to become an independent handicraft. China is a major jade producer in the world. According to Shan Hai Jing (Book on Mountains and Seas), an ancient writing about geography, there are more than two hundred palces where jade is found, which means that the source of jade is inexhaustible in China. Hetian of Xinjiang is a well-known place of JDE ORIGIN IN China; Jiuquan of Gansu, Lantian of Shaanxi, Dushan and Mixian of Henan, and Xiuyan of Liaoning are also rich in quality jade resources.

Generally, the procedure of jade carving includes jade observation, designing, opening, piercing, cutting and polishing.

Yu the Great Curbing the Flood, a jade carving of Qing Dynasty, the world’s largest jade piece. 224cm high, 96cm wide, more than 5,000kg in weight. It is now kept in Palace Museum.

Tang Rongzuo, a collector in the late Qing Dynasty, once wrote a book entitled Of Jade in which the working procedure, methods and implements in carving jade ware are illustrated with twelve color drawings. As viewed from the perspective of craft, a jade artwork with superb workmanship excelling nature is not made by carvin, but by grinding with water using minerals such as emery, silicon, garnet, etc. that are harder than jade. Therefore the process of jade making is called jade rolling or jade grinding. While the skills in grinding jade are superb, the tools used are simple and crude. The primitive implement used is simply a revolving round disk called tuo (emery wheel), which is used to move emery which rubs, smoothes and polished jade. During he Neolithic Age and the Bronze Age when ironware was not yet been invented, tools used were largely made from wood, bamboo, animal bone compounded with sandstone. Until the modern times, Chinese people always used traditional tools in the manufacture of jade artworks such as wire saw, round disc made of steel and wrought iron, etc.
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Embroidery in China goes back to ancient times. Some four thousand years ago when China was passing from primitive society to slave society, there was as rule that the tribal leaders should wear formal attire with patterns of the sun, the moon, and stars embroidered on the upper garment; of weeds, fire, etc., on trousers (skirts) when grand ceremonies were held such as celebrations, sacrifice-offerings, etc.

In the spring and autumn and the warring states period, along with the progress of agriculture, the lifestyle that men plough the fields and women weave became more firmly fixed, mulberry-and—hemp planting and spinning-and-weaving extensively spread, and the embroidery craft grew mature gradually. To date the earliest embroidery works handed down from ancient times are the two pieces unearthed from the Chu Tombs in the Warring States Period. By applying braid embroidering method (also known as locking embroidering) that features neat stitch, flowing line, and tasteful coloring, the patterns of swimming-dragon and dancing-phoenix; fierce-tiger and auspicious-beast embroidered on silks appear natural and lifelike, which gives full expression to the achievements of embroidery art in the ancient State of Chu.

When it came to Qin and Han dynasty, the art of embroidery further developed following the progress of silk-spinning. A diversified batch of embroidered works well preserved was unearthed from the Han tombs at Mawangdui of Changsha, Hu’nan Province. These embroideries, which represent the artistic style as well as the high level of embroidery in the Han Dynasty, mostly have patterns of ripple-like clouds, soaring phoenix, galloping holy beast, ribbon-shaped flowers, geometric figures, etc., using basically locking method with neat stitching, compact composition and smooth lines.
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China is a world-renowned ancient country of ceramic, which has long been one of the most significant traditional handicrafts in China. As early as the early Neolithic Age 8,000 years ago, earthenware was already made and used. During the mid-Shang Dynasty, porcelain in its rudimentary form started to appear. In terms of crafts, pottery and porcelain are both silicate products made atdifferent stage of development, porcelain being derived from pottery. They differ in raw materials, firing temperature and physical properties. Pottery was not pase out when porcelain invented, but continued to develop on its own course parallel to that of porcelain.

During the late Neolithic Age, painted pottery emerged as an outstanding variety of handiwork. And the then Neolithic Culture was called Painted Pottery Culture, also known as Yangshao Culture, named after Yangshao Village, Mianchi County, Henan Province where relics abound in pottery painted with colorful patterns were first found. Painted pottery is a kind of earthenware in reddish brown or pale brown with red or black decorative patterns elegant in shape and exquisite in design. Painted pottery was distributed over a vast area, including the Yangshao Culture region in the upper and middle reaches of the Yello Rver, the Dawenkou Culture region in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River (dating back to 4,500-6,400 years ago), and the Hemudu Culture region in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, of which Yangshao Culture was the most flourishing. Painted pottery was superior in ornamentation. As people at that time used to place utensils on the ground, the ornamental patterns tended to take an upper position while taking into consideration at the same time the vertical view and the side view so as to embody an integral effect.
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