By Zhao Zihan

2018 Chaozhou International Embroidery Art Biennale （Biennale for short） was held in Chaozhou on December 20th， 2018. It was the first national embroidery art biennale in China and the first international embroidery art biennale in the world.

It is approved by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of China， sponsored by China National Textile and Apparel Council （CNTAC）， Guangdong Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism， Chaozhou Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China， Chaozhou Municipal Peoples Government， and jointly organized by Chaozhou Traditional Craft Workstation of CNTAC， China Embroidery Art Research Institute of CNTAC， Fiber Art Institute of the Academy of Arts& Design， Tsinghua University， Chaozhou Famory Embroidery Academy， and Guangdong Famory （Group） Co.， Ltd.

The Biennale features three topics： “Life & Fashion”， “Inheritance & Rejuvenation”， and “Integration & Transcendence”， exhibiting a total of 249 works from 13 countries and regions， including China， Japan， South Korea， Georgia， Poland， Denmark， Germany， Switzerland， the Netherlands， Norway， Sweden， Canada， and the United States. The works well illustrated the theme of “Embroidery and Contemporary Life”， showing the infinite charm of embroidery art with rich characteristics of the times， and exploring the ways and paths of traditional skills into contemporary life.

The exhibits are categorized into such three parts as embroidery artwork， embroidery daily necessities， and embroidered cultural products. The Biennale will last until January 5th， 2019.

For the Biennale， Gao Yong， Party Secretary and Secretary General of CNTAC， delivered a speech at the opening ceremony. He said that this year marks the 40th anniversary of the reform and opening up. The implementation of the “Belt and Road Initiative” cannot only promote cooperation in the fields of economy， trade and commerce， but also bring new opportunities for China and the world in terms of cultural exchanges. Chinese embroidery is making more and more outstanding contributions to the building of the “Belt and Road” cultural prosperity and the promotion of great power diplomacy.

Gao Yong also pointed out that the Biennale aims to effectively promote the entry of intangible cultural heritage into the contemporary mass life and the integration into the international fashion trend. Chaozhou will be built into a platform to promote exchanges and cooperation between the embroidery industry at home and abroad， providing new thinking， new themes and new ideas for embroidery creation， enabling traditional skills to find new development opportunities and environments， making the creation of embroidery works more contemporary and artistic， and promoting the application of embroidery art in household goods， daily necessities and creative cultural products.

It is hoped that this Biennial will be a professional， large-scale and international exhibition， providing a stage for the related people who are dedicated to embroidery research， embroidery creation and embroidery art inheritance at home and abroad.

Li Dingqi， the chief curator， said： “The bottleneck in the development of many intangible cultural heritage industries lies in the lack of design capabilities of practitioners and insufficient innovation capabilities.” He hopes that through this platform， the exchanges between Chinese and foreign artists will inspire the Chinese practitioners to activate their imagination and creativity. “That many works exhibited in the Biennial won the final selection is not because of its technique， but the creativity. The artistic value of such works cannot be estimated. Some masters also sent us very wonderful works； however， the base pictures they used are not authorized by the original author. Therefore， the reviewers could not have the works left for exhibition. He said that there are many embroidery authors who cannot make their own works because of their lack of innovative ability， plus the poor awareness of intellectual property right， greatly restricting the further development of embroidery. He hopes that the masters and practitioners will further advance their innovative thinking and intellectual property awareness through the Biennale.