Insisting On "Unusual And Unique Learning" To Explore The Code Of Chu Clothing Culture -- Interview With Wang Ke, A Professor Of Wuhan Textile University

One day in mid September, when the reporter walked into the office of Professor Wang Ke of Wuhan Textile University, Wang Ke was combing the disk named "Chu Studies" in the computer. For more than 8 years, the disk was almost filled with layers of electronic documents.

Wang Ke's research on Chu costumes revolves around the word "seeking". In the literature materials such as bamboo slips, poems, essays and research materials since the pre Qin period, he has been obsessed with looking for the figure of Chu costumes and exploring the cultural code of Chu costumes. Although he encountered a lot of hardships, he always enjoyed it.

Only "literature+material object" research is reliable

Chu State, located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, was a vassal state during the two Zhou Dynasty. From the establishment of the state during the reign of King Cheng of Zhou Dynasty to the destruction of Qin Dynasty, Chu State has existed for more than 800 years in history.

In 1982, archaeologists excavated Mashan No.1 Tomb in Jiangling, Hubei Province, and a batch of silk fabrics and embroidery were completely preserved, including silk, yarn, silk, brocade, embroidery, tapestry and other silk fabrics of the Warring States Period. Many fabrics were discovered for the first time, known as the "silk treasure house". Their excavation proves that Chu had a splendid clothing culture.

Historians often say that "the Yangtze River civilization is one of the two sources of Chinese civilization", and Chu costumes are an important embodiment of the Yangtze River civilization in the pre Qin period.

Wang Ke is a "post-80s generation". During his study of Qing Dynasty costumes, he benefited from a wealth of material objects and historical data, and achieved many academic achievements. In 2013, when he came to work in Hubei, he was attracted by the romantic feelings of Chu people represented by Qu Yuan and took Chu culture as his research direction. After feasibility analysis and topic selection demonstration, he decided to study Chu clothing. Soon, he encountered a "Waterloo" in academic research, the most common exclamation is "too little".

In the tombs more than 2000 years ago, the clothes unearthed were basically fragments. Except for Tomb No. 1 in Mashan, few other tombs have such large-scale clothes unearthed. Even though it is known as the "Silk Treasure", only dozens of clothing related objects were unearthed in Tomb 1 of Mashan, and less than 200 images can be used by combining other related materials.

In order to understand the cultural code of Chu costumes from a limited number of images, Wang Ke must rely on literature, but literature records of Chu costumes in the pre-qin period are also rare. Take ceremonial dress as an example. In ancient times, dress and ritual system were closely linked. However, as a vassal state, the Chu State left few materials about the ritual system of dress. To study the ritual system of Chu's dress, we can only refer to the Zhou Rites of the same era, or explore from historical books such as Spring and Autumn Annals and Zuo Zhuan.

Reliable written records are not nowhere to be found. Wang Ke's method is to trace the source of previous research - first find the references in academic articles, and then trace the original text from the references. Many times, the original text is an ancient book, and the library has no materials or is difficult to borrow because of its rarity. Wang Ke can only contact around to borrow online ancient book resources.

After finding the clues of Chu Fu in the literature, he confirmed with the unearthed objects, and finally formed a credible and reliable academic conclusion.

Technical blessing reappears "cold and unique skills"

Limited by the number of unearthed objects and the difficulty of research, Wang Ke has not made many academic achievements in recent years. Measured by academic papers, he has two to three papers a year, which is a scholar with slow output and few achievements in the academic community. In this regard, Wang Ke is also more open-minded: "The study of Chu costumes is not urgent, and one article will have its weight."

In 2019, the special project of the National Social Science Fund "Research on the Dress of the State of Chu", chaired by Wang Ke, was approved, and the research team was very excited.

"Unusual and Unique Learning" is the only fund project without research years among all national social science funds - participating scholars can continue to study until there are satisfactory research results. This feature also confirms the difficulty of studying Chu costumes from the side.

Faced with such an "endless" research project, is there any other research method other than comparing clothing objects and decrypting clothing codes in the vast literature? Wang Ke's exploration is to do experiments and recover.

Cai Hong, a graduate student of the research group, is interested in the cotton robe unearthed from the Chu Tomb No. This cloth is rectangular, connecting the sleeves and the body. Cai Hong started from the structure of the inlay, first used the commonly used white cloth to restore the structure of the Chu clothes. By increasing or decreasing the length of the inlay and changing the angle of the inlay, he tested the role of the inlay in the clothes.

For this reason, Cai Hong has made four design schemes. After one year's test, he believes that the inlay can increase or decrease the waistline circumference and improve the wearing convenience. On the other hand, it can also stabilize the clothing shape. With the inlay, the tailor can wrap the body with limited fabrics. This means that in the pre Qin period, Chinese people have used the idea of three-dimensional modeling in clothing design.

The team professor Guo Fengqiu showed a restored dress of the State of Chu - light yellow silk phoenix bird flower cotton gown in the class Chu Culture and Art. The romantic and strange pattern of "three headed phoenix" excited the students. This summer, Wang Ke sent Song Kexin, a graduate student, to the China Silk Museum to learn how to use digital technology to repair incomplete Chu costumes. The blessing of digital restoration technology has opened up new possibilities for the study of Chu costumes.

"Academic achievements are 'temporary', and they may be confirmed or overturned due to the discovery of new objects or documents." Wang Ke said that, as a college teacher, we should not only see the academic significance of the study of Chu costumes, but also make the study of Chu costumes no longer "can only be viewed from a distance and not be played with profanity". Students can also use clothing structure and modern technology to make plates and try plates by themselves, In practice, I deeply feel the wisdom of creation of the ancients thousands of years ago.