Digitization helps preserve, disseminate intangible culture heritage

In a surprising antic aimed at spurring young people's interests in traditional art, a famed traditional leather-silhouette show in Huaxian has been used to create attires for characters in the popular video game "Honor of Kings" and give performance on the theme of the famous game "Black Myth: Wukong."

This suggests that artisans are leveraging modern, digital elements in making legacy art more accessible to younger, or global, audience.

Widely considered the living fossil of the art, the leather-silhouette show in Huaxian County, Shaanxi Province, has enjoyed accolades for the exquisiteness evinced in the carving of the leather, mostly bovine; the cadence of the singing that accompanies the puppets performance; and the dexterity and versatility of the string-holding hands: a single pair of hands can juggle dozens, or about a hundred, puppet figurines.

Like many once popular traditional art legacies, Huaxian silhouette is reinventing itself in a bid to pass down as a cultural heritage while keeping abreast of the times.

In justifying the seemingly unlikely marriage between art and games, Wang Haiyan, the fifth-generation inheritor of the silhouette art, credited as a master in this craft, pointed to a common dilemma confronting inheritors like herself.

"The development of any intangible cultural heritage (ICH) should first tackle the issue of livelihood, and only when there is an entrenched market base, with committed inheritors and resources, can we hope to proceed with the subsequent work of cultural protection and innovation," Wang said during a recent forum in Shanghai.

Jointly sponsored by the Cultural Innovation and Development Research Center, the University of Southern California-Shanghai Jiao Tong University Institute of Cultural and Creative Industry, College of Fashion and Design, Donghua University, and the Interdisciplinary Research Center for Computing and Art, Northwestern Polytechnical University, the forum focused on the digital dissemination of ICH and innovation.

One of the innovative, revolutionary moves she has taken in cooperation with fellow inheritors is digital innovation, throughout the shadow performance, from carving the leathery figures to the design of the patters, all in the service of preserving this art form.

By innovation, Wang said her family, from her father to her son, has brought Huaxian silhouette into the Venice Biennale and entered into cooperative deals with fashion brands such as Hermes and Fendi, and even new brand Pop Mart.

This sentiment is shared by Zou Yuanhan, a third-generation inheritor of Suxiu, or Suzhou embroidery, one of the four kinds in China known for its exquisiteness, originality, elegance, and subtlety.

Zou's family has not only inherited the skills of Suzhou embroidery, but promoted its style of depicting the beauty of the world through various collaborations, ranging from milk tea cups and coffee art to other creative products.

Zou believed that through integration with creative art products and even drinks, embroidery is perceived as something more than purely aesthetic, having acquired new properties, such as in adjusting emotions, or even healing psychologically. By turning cultural assets into emotive resources, Zou said the art has found a means to communicate with the new generation.

Forum panellists seem to double down on the message that, with the rapid development of digital technology, ICH is entering a new stage of digital and smart cohesion, with artificial intelligence (AI) and virtual reality (VR) tools not only facilitating the digital preservation and dissemination of ICH, but also enabling its diversified expression in the modern context.

At the forum themed on digital and smart inheritance and cultural co-prosperity, participating ICH researchers, inheritors and practitioners engaged in in-depth discussions on topics ranging from digital ICH dissemination, digital representation of ICH, and the aesthetics and design relating to digital representation.

Digital transformation of ICH was not only a matter of technological application, but also an embodiment of cultural confidence, reasserted Xue Ke, head of the Cultural Innovation and Development Research Center, USC-SJTU Institute of Cultural and Creative Industry.

Xue said that rapid digital development is creating unprecedented opportunities for ICH protection and dissemination.

"We can not only preserve the essence of traditional art, but also vest the heritage with new life and modern chic through innovative expression," Xue added.

In addressing the forum, Sun Jie, dean of College of Fashion and Design, Donghua University, said that ICH is not only a repository of memory of the Chinese people, but also a fountainhead of modern design innovation and cultural expression.

"As a bridge linking tradition and the future, design should play an active role in the modern expression of ICH, facilitating its accessibility to young people and the global community, through immersive, interactive and lifelike experiences," Sun noted.

While both the old and new generations agree that going digital could play a role in facilitating the ICH integration in modern society through digital empowerment, there are issues that need to be clarified before we move ahead.

As pointed out by Wang, the silhouette master, AI could significantly raise video generation efficiency, but its cognizance of traditional details such as texture and style could leave much to be desired. As a result, the silhouette database being built is still in a stage of optimization through trial and error.

Zou, the Suzhou embroidery master, believed that AI is good for foreign-oriented propagation and introduction to the content, but real ICH inheritance is still predicated on real experience and the individualized inculcation and apprenticeship. In other words, digital tools are mere aids to instruction, not part and parcel of the process.

In recent years there have been significant developments in the dissemination of cultural legacy through digital representation.

For instance, in the hugely successful video game "Black Myth: Wukong," the use of 3D scanning and virtual asset libraries to reproduce ancient architectural details, such as the wall sculptures of Shuilu Temple in Lantian, Shaanxi Province, has been much extolled. This digitization approach not only preserves cultural heritage but also makes it known to a global audience.

As the game's producer noted, "ICH is a treasure tested by time. Digital technology and interactive entertainment offer a way to breathe new life into these traditions without compromising their essence."

In doing so, "Black Myth: Wukong," and numerous other followers, are charting a new path for preserving humanity's intangible legacy in the digital age, in an eminently financially viable manner.