Pingtan and Kun Opera
Suzhou Pingtan is a kind of story-telling art in Wu dialect. It includes two types: Suzhou Pinghua and Suzhou Tanci (story telling to the accompaniment of stringed instruments). The history of Pingtan can be dated up to Tang and Song dynasties. It was trans-formed to the present form during the late Ming Dynasty and early Qing Dynasty. In the first half of this century, Pingtan was popular in the rural areas of Jiangnan, or South of Yangtze River. It was said then that wherever there is a teahouse, there was the art of Pingtan staged in Wu dialect
Suzhou local dance takes production, labor and living of women in river village as its embryo, uses light, lively, slow and emotion-expressing Jiangnan music and Pingtan Qupai music as its accompanying music. The dance movements are flexible and various. As for stage art arrangements, some is leaping in happiness, some is slim and graceful, some is humorous, creating a feeling of freshness and gracefulness for audience. The subjects of Suzhou local dance mostly come from everyday life, such as "Boating Girl", "Embroidering Girl", "Knitting girl", "Fishing Girl", "Flower Girl", "Silkworm Girl" and "Bride", etc. The dance has distinctive river village style and strong local color, and develops a school of its own in domestic dance circle. It is very popular with tourists at home and abroad.
Su Embroidery Art
Together with Xiang Embroidery, Shu Embroidery and Yue Embroidery, Su Embroidery is famed as one of Nation's Top 4 Embroideries. Su Embroider has a long history. From Ming Dynasty, there were embroidering girls all over towns and villages, schools multiplied and skilled people doing embroidery came forth one after another. Su Embroidery has been famous for a long time for its "exquisiteness, elegance and cleanness". Skilled ones doing embroidery pulled threads and excelled nature. Su Embroidery is beautiful in pattern, elegant in color and refined and unique in embroidering.
Su Embroidery has characteristics such as "smoothness" the surface of embroidery is smooth and submissive, "uniform" the outline edge is uniform, "exquisiteness" needle is used skillfully and threads are slender, "denseness" the arrangement of lines is tight and no needle trace is protruding, "softness" the degree of depth of color is suitable and "brightness" dazzling and colorful, etc.
Patterns of expression of Su Embroider is various, such as single-side embroider, double-side embroider, thin-needle embroider, random-needle embroider, thin-random needle mixed embroider, double-side and different colors, different patterns and different-needle embroider, etc. Works of Su Embroider is rich in levels, strong in nature, deep in meanings, and affords food for thought.
In tradition, works of Su Embroider takes golden fish and cats as its main subjects, and now, it has developed to embroider flowers, classic fine arts works, portraits and photographic works, etc.
Noble and elegant works of Su Embroider is very popular with international tourists and is famed as "Oriental Pearls". It was once designated as a gift for foreign head of state by the State Council.
Wumen Fine Arts School
Wumen Fine Arts School had forcibly ruled the national fine arts circle proximately during the period from Ming' Jingtai to Jiajing years (1450-1565). Shen Zhou, Wen Zhengming, Tang Yin and Qiu Ying were the representative painters of Wumen Fine Arts. Till late years of Shen Zhou, Wumen Fine Arts School had gradually risen up. And till the times of Wen Zhengming and Tang Yin, the fine arts school had become an out-standing school in China's fine arts circle. Later, Suzhou painters rising up from Wumen Fine Arts School were Chen Daofu, Qian Gu, Lu Zhi, Wang Guxiang, Wen Peng, Wen Jia, Wen Boren, Zhou Zhimian, Xu Hengze, Lu Shidao, Zhu Lang, Ju Jie, Chen Kuo, Wang Chong, Xie Shichen and Zhou Tianqiu, and they were all individuals recorded in China's Fine Arts History.
The main characteristics of Wumen Fine Arts School in art are as following. It not only inherited traditional styles of Yuan hermitic painters, but also learned from all predecessors, extensively absorbed everyone's strong points, and combined them into its own new style. Many painters of Wumen Fine Arts School lived in Suzhou all the time, and they painted all mountains and rivers in Suzhou with their own brushes and formed their own artistic features. These painters possess multiple artistic accomplishments. Not only Shen, Wen, Tang and Qiu's poem, calligraphy and painting are 3 stunts, but their successors also had high culture accomplishments and they could write, make poems and paint, and some of them even were famous seal cutters, and most of their works had the characteristics of catering to both refined and popular tastes.
Wumen Fine Arts School not only occupies a glorious page in China Fine Arts History, but also has been in the leading place of Ming-Qing landscape painting circle for over 400 years and continues to progress till today. At present, Suzhou establishes Academy of Traditional Chinese Painting and that of Wumen Painting, and sets up Guwuxuan Publishing House. Artists inherit and expand the Wumen Fine Arts School's painting characteristics of simplicity, prettiness, brightness, freshness and expressing soft feelings with strong strokes, and they combine each school's strong points, absorb extensively and constantly create new painting styles.