In January 2006 I was invited to be an artist in residence at Lijiang Studios in Lijiang, China (Yunnan province). Lijiang is a small city in Southwestern China near Tibet and the Himalayas. It is a place of great scenic beauty, diverse plant life,and a long tradition of hand papermaking. Lijiang is home to the Naxi people,an ethnic minority of Tibetan–Burmese heritage. For the Naxi, the Dongba arethe shamans, teachers and artists who conduct ceremonies, hold rituals, writescriptures, and make paper as needed in the community. Traditionally Dongbapaper is used solely by Dongba monks for the sacred Dongba writings andscriptures. The Dongba religion is based on worship of the spirits of nature,and the scriptures record in a pictographic language the stories and ritualspassed down for generations. The Dongba language is the world’s onlypictographic language still in active use. Besides its ritual function, Dongbapaper has become an item for tourists to buy. True Dongba handmade paper isbecoming rare because the plant is no longer so plentiful and because feweryoung Dongba have the skill or knowledge of papermaking. The plant used forDongba paper is Wikstroemia lichiangensis in the Daphne family. It is referredto as kewandai in the Naxi language. In English it is sometimes translated as“string bush.” This small tree/shrub grows near mountain streams at 2,600 to3,500 meters above sea level in the Naxi region of Yunnan. In the 1950s to1970s industrial papermaking mills in the area nearly depleted the supply ofkewandai. Recently there has been an effort to grow the plant from seeds andcuttings, but with limited success since this plant grows best in the wild.This is also the case with gampi, the Japanese plant that is anotherWikstroemia variety. Kewandai produces paper that is insect resistant and lastsfor hundreds of years. Novice papermakers are cautioned against keeping theirhands in the pulp for long periods of time since the plant contains medicinalproperties that numb the skin. Kewandai is used in herbal medicine for thispurpose, somewhat like a local anesthetic. The experienced Dongba papermakersare immune to kewandai’s numbing effect. The bark fiber of kewandai is long andlustrous. The outer bark is not removed in the Dongba process of papermaking.The Dongba papermaker submerges the mould in water, pours pulp onto the mould,moves it about with the hands to disperse the pulp evenly, and then lifts themould. No formation aid is used. The traditional sheet size is about 10 ½ x 23inches. The papermaking mould is made of bamboo strips covered with a hand-sewncoarse bamboo mat and a layer of finer cotton mesh fabric on top. The deckle isa frame of rough wood. The newly formed sheets are couched directly onto thedrying boards and placed in the sun to dry. The Dongba make larger sheets byoverlapping the couched sheets on the drying boards. One side of the paper issmooth because it is dried on metal-covered boards. After the sheets are dried,the papermaker removes them from the drying boards and burnishes the paper’ssurface with a stone. In the past, Dongbas were descendent shamans, withtraditions and knowledge passed from father to son. Today there is a school inLijiang at the government-sponsored Dongba Institute to train young men in theDongba traditions. I toured the school and watched the Dongba making paper fortourists who were visiting the Institute. They used a traditional papermakingvat, a carved-out wooden log. The Dongba demonstrated writing on their handmadepaper using a brush with black ink made from burned plant materials. TheInstitute houses a collection of older writings on Dongba paper and displays awall exhibit of the Dongba pictograms. The paper sample [on page 8] is made byLi Xueguang, the master Dongba papermaker in the area. I visited his home andstudio just outside Lijiang. Mr. Li appeared to be in his mid-fifties and hasbeen making paper since he was a young boy. He gathers the bark himself withother younger Dongbas and his family each fall. He keeps secret his foragingareas so I did not see the plant growing. He showed me his fiber storage roomwith many strips of dried bark. He cooks the bark in iron pots over open firesfor several days without the aid of cooking agents. His papermaking vat is anold bathtub. His original log vat was lying nearby in disrepair. His mould andbeating tools, all of which he made himself from rough wood and bamboo, are oftraditional design. Unfortunately he was not making paper when I visited him inJanuary. It was too cold for papermaking at that time. Dongba paper is fascinatingto me because of the unique plant fiber and its raw, primitive character withlong-lasting properties. I am intrigued by its traditional use for scripturesand sacred writings of the Dongba culture, and find inspiration in the pursuitof my own artwork in the Dongba pictographic writing and imagery.
Dongba written pictographic language at the DongbaInstitute, Lijiang, Yunnan province, China. January 2007. Photo: Timothy S.Allen. All photos courtesy of the author. Dongba student making paper at theDongba Institute, Lijiang, Yunnan province, China. January 2007. Photo: TimothyS. Allen
Li Xueguang couches a newly formed sheet onto ametal-covered drying board. May 2007. Photo: Jay Brown. left: Li Xueguang formsa sheet of paper in his bathtub vat. May 2007. Photo: Jay Brown..
