Ice Carving
Ice carving, a seasonal art in the far north of China,
is also called "ice lanterns" and has its
origin in local life. To prevent lights from being blown out by the
winter wind, people started long, long ago to use hollowed ice blocks
as lantern bulbs, giving the art its primitive form.
The citizens of Harbin, capital of the northernmost Heilongjiang Province,
put on the first "ice lantern show" in the
winter of 1963. By means of moulds they made various ice lanterns, in
which they lighted candles. It proved a success and established a custom:
since then an "ice festival" has been held
every year lasting from New Year's Day to the
traditional Lantern Festival about mind-February), with the
scale growing ever larger and the skills more and more perfected. Apart
from the usual lanterns, pavilions, terraces, bridges and towers are
built in ice to decorate the landscapes formed by sparkling mountains,
crystal trees, glistening birds and animals, fish swimming in transparent
pools. Ice sculpture is also found to be an artistic
from suitable for reproducing scenes of well-known dramas and stories
of science fiction often seen at the festival. Some works are of colossal
dimensions: a pagoda may be built of up to 200 huge
ice blocks, and it makes and impressive sight when lighted at night
by hundreds of built-in colored lamps. The ice show, with its translucent
works and sparkling lights, reminds visitors of the fabled emerald and
crystal palace of the legendary Dragon King.
The main material for ice sculpture is obtained from the rivers. With
the mercury constantly kept down at minus 20-30 oC in winter, the water
in the north provide an inexhaustible supply of ice. It is first sawn
by workmen into blocks, and then the sculptors will
put them to different uses according to thickness, strength and transparency.
A large work is usually assembled of many component pieces.
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