Shaping Beauty

img.0All images courtesy of Ruixue song

Sophomore students of China’s central academy of fine arts were given the opportunity to travel to Shandong Bo Xing, a city rich with the tradition of straw braid craft. The class was given reign to explore steamed cattail, banana leaf, rattan peel, corn leaf and a variety of other natural materials. It was asked of them to keep an open mind of their surroundings, and attempt to create products that would allow users minds to drift back to the root culture and craftsmen who helped realize the pieces. The project was called, ‘the sight of things reminds one of the person’. different proposals and questions tackled issues of generational differences, and the valuing of cultures based on graphic representations. Each work exhibits the transmittal of ideas by China’s up-and-coming designers to physical wares and objects by China’s most skilled artisans. 

img.1‘hotel’ stool, linjie xu

img.2banana leaf, nylon wire satchel by shuang song 

img.3cotton wire, steamed cattail, & rattan peel bag by shuang song

img.4steamed cattail & doeskin camera case by shenghan cai

img.5‘cattail cloth'; steamed cattail & banana leaf, qiyu han

img.6‘cattail cloth’, qiyu han 

img.7‘small monster’, mixed media, penfei he 

img.8‘cattail table’, mixed media, tianhe li 

img.9banana leaf is just as strong and practical as straw braid

img.10camera bag with varnished exterior 

img.11the pattern reveals the development of a small village in bo xing

Via Designboom