Gu's Embroidery

Gu's embroidery originated with Miao, the concubine of Gu Huihai, son of Gu Mingshi, a Jinshi in Songjiang Prefecture during the 38th year of the Jiajing reign in the Ming Dynasty. It is the only embroidery school in Jiangnan named after a family. Gu's granddaughter-in-law, Han Ximeng, was skilled in painting and had a unique mastery of stitches and color, which greatly enhanced the artistic quality of this embroidery style. As a result, Gu's embroidery is also known as "painting embroidery."

According to the Songjiang County Chronicles from the Chongzhen period of the Ming Dynasty, "Gu's embroidery, with squares adorned with flowers and birds and sachets featuring figures, was intricately crafted, unmatched by any other county." This art form is distinguished by three main characteristics: first, it blends embroidery and painting, excelling in the use of complementary and borrowed colors; second, it employs unique materials; third, it utilizes intermediate colors to create a blurred effect. Han Ximeng, a key figure in Gu's embroidery, used this technique to replicate eight famous paintings from the Song and Yuan Dynasties over several years, earning widespread acclaim. Dong Qichang, a leading painter of the Songjiang School during the Ming Dynasty, praised Gu's embroidery as "exquisite and ingenious, unparalleled by others... a testament to human ingenuity at its finest."

Han Ximeng's innovations marked the early development of Gu's embroidery, leading to the creation of the "painting embroidery" stage. At this time, most embroidery work was done by women at home, known as "Han Yuan embroidery," primarily for family collections or as gifts. However, after Han Ximeng's time, the Gu family fell into decline and began to rely on women's embroidery for their livelihood, eventually transitioning from family needlework to commercial embroidery. Gu Mingshi's great-granddaughter, Gu Lanyu, was trained by Miao and Han, and continued the family tradition. According to the Songjiang Prefecture Chronicle from the Jiaqing period of the Qing Dynasty, Gu Lanyu "excelled at needlework, established a workshop to teach apprentices, and attracted female students from all over. At the time, it was also known as Gu's embroidery. The technique of Gu's embroidery was passed down, and its reputation spread far and wide."

During the Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty, Songjiang's Ding Pei, an expert in embroidery and painting theory, wrote the Embroidery Book, in which he detailed the wonders of Gu's embroidery. By this time, Gu's embroidery had become so renowned that all embroidery in Suzhou was labeled as Gu's embroidery, and shops adopted the name as well.

In the early 20th century, the Songjun Women's Vocational School in Songjiang established a Gu embroidery class. Dai Mingjiao, now nearly 90 years old, was a student in this class and has served as a key inheritor of Gu's embroidery in Songjiang for nearly half a century. She authored A Preliminary Study on Gu's Embroidery Needlework, documenting the intricate techniques of this craft.

Gu's embroidery is the product of a unique fusion between folk embroidery and literati painting. Practitioners must be skilled in traditional calligraphy and painting, which makes the craft difficult to popularize due to its time-consuming and labor-intensive nature. After the 1950s, numerous Gu's embroidery factories were established in Shanghai, but most have since closed. The rise of modern industry has led to an influx of imitations flooding the market, threatening the integrity of true Gu's embroidery. Although the name of Gu's embroidery remains well-known, few in Shanghai truly understand the art of "painting embroidery." To preserve this cultural heritage, urgent measures must be taken to rescue, protect, document, and revive this traditional embroidery art.