From May 11th to 19th, ‘Shuo Wen Jie Zi: The European Tour of Traditional Chinese Fashion Culture’ hosted by the Center for Language Education and Cooperation, DHU’s College of Fashion and Design, incollaboration with the National Language and Writing Promotion Base, University of Finance and Administration, Institute of Technology and Business in České Budějovice, University of Primorska, Zadarska National College of Art and Design and other institutions was successfully completed.
This exhibition tour spans across the Czech Republic, Slovenia, and Croatia, which is a vivid manifestation of the College of Fashion and Design's practice of the ‘global vision, international collaboration’ talent cultivation path. It also uses clothing as a medium to build a bridge for mutual learning between Chinese and European civilizations.
The exhibition innovatively adopts the narrative logic of ‘carrying the message with clothing’ using clothing from various dynasties as a carrier, decoding the philosophy of ‘unity of heaven and man’ and the wisdom of ritual systems contained in the patterns. It uses AR technology to achieve the dynamic integration of Dunhuang caisson patterns and Rococo decorative art, presenting a ’touchable epic of Eastern civilization’ for European audiences. To engage in a conversation crossing time and space, between the beauty of engravings on oracle bone, the wisdom of the jacquard patterns which is a intangible cultural heritage, and the luxury of Baroque gold threads and the sharpness of Gothic aesthetics.
The overall planner and project leader of this exhibition, Professor Liu Hui, said “This exhibition is not only a display of traditional skills, but also an international extension of the ‘college's art and engineering intersection’ concept. We activate cultural heritage through digital means and empower cross-cultural communication with design language, which is a vivid classroom for cultivating ‘sustainable design innovation’ talents.” Lvana Kovacic, Dean of the Zadarska National College of Art and Design, praised: “The collision between the ' implicit code' of Chinese clothing patterns and the ‘ explicit expression’ of European decorative aesthetics provides a new paradigm for global fashion design." This exhibition also launched the joint construction plan of the' Silk Road Digital Pattern Library ', and in the future, we will cooperate with European partner universities to carry out the comparative research of clothing pattern semantics, contributing eastern wisdom to building a fashionable and civilized community.
(precious exhibits such as Han and Tang decorations, ethnic costumes, and innovative designs for modern intangible cultural heritage)
As part of the ‘International Chinese Language Day’ series of activities organized by Center for Language Education and Cooperation, the exhibition innovatively takes ‘characters and patterns’ in traditional Chinese clothing as the entry point. Through a five in one exhibition format which means ‘character evolution + pattern connotation + intangible cultural heritage skills + creative achievements + academic forum", it explores the global dissemination of multilingual digitalization of Chinese textile and clothing culture, while systematically explains the profound connotations of Chinese character culture and clothing aesthetics to European audiences, and creates a diverse and intertwined fashion aesthetic feast of characters, clothing, patterns, and intangible cultural heritage.
(On site lectures on the profound heritage and evolution trajectory of Chinese characters and traditional clothing culture)
Clothing is a flowing history of civilization. This exhibition is not only an innovative expression of China's excellent traditional culture, but also an attitude conveying to the world of China that ‘Cherishing one’s own beauty and the world will become a harmonious whole’. This European exhibition showcases nearly a hundred precious exhibits, including calligraphy, ethniccostumes, and creative design works of intangible cultural heritage. Through physical displays, digital interactions, and academic exchanges, the traditional culture and philosophical ideas behind words and patterns are narrated. The evolution of Chinese characters, the symbolic meanings of patterns, and the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage weaving techniques... are all vividly interpreted, leave European audiences intuitively experience of the Eastern aesthetic wisdom of ’explaining patterns and characters’.
(International friends experience the intangible cultural heritage skills of clothing culture)
‘Shuo Wen Jie Zi: The European Tour of Traditional Chinese Fashion Culture’ adheres to the mission of promoting excellent traditional Chinese culture, serving national strategies with academic innovation. This event uses clothing as language and creativity as a bridge, connecting China with the world, education and society, tradition and the future promoting the deep integration and development of fashion culture and technology in upholding integrity and innovation, and continuing the Chinese cultural context in creative transformation and innovative development.
