Reporter: Lin Zhiyuan

The wood of Dongyang is often more silent than people. It grows in the mountains and forests, storing its grain through the years, until one day it is awakened again by a pair of hands. When the blade falls, wood shavings curl softly, and mountains, waters, flowers, birds, pavilions, and figures emerge from deep within the grain. For Lu Ting, woodcarving is not about carving patterns into wood, but about following the wood’s own veins and slowly revealing the imagery hidden within.

In Lu Ting’s studio, the most vivid presence is not any finished work, but the process of creation itself. Timber leans against the wall, sketches are spread across the worktable, and carving knives and tools rest quietly in place. Unfinished layers pause between light and shadow. There is no excessive display or noise here, only a slow and focused order. Lu Ting says that woodcarving cannot be rushed. Wood has its own temperament; its grain, hardness, shrinkage, and flaws all affect the direction of the blade. If a woodcarver only thinks about expressing himself, he may easily overlook the material itself. A truly mature creator must first learn to understand the wood.

This ability to “understand” comes from more than three decades of hands-on experience. From January 1993 to December 2003, Lu Ting worked as a woodcarving technician and craftsman at Dongyang Woodcarving General Factory. From January 2004 to September 2013, he served as a woodcarving craftsman and designer at Dongyang Lu Guangzheng Studio. Since October 2013, he has served as General Manager and Chief Designer of Dongyang Lu Guangzheng Arts and Crafts Co., Ltd. From craftsman to designer, and then to the person coordinating corporate creation and project execution, his role has continued to change, yet his way of facing wood has remained the same: understand first, then carve; establish the artistic intent first, then give it form.

In Lu Ting’s view, the difficulty of Dongyang woodcarving lies not merely in “fine carving.” Fineness is craftsmanship, but it is far from everything. Dongyang woodcarving values layers, lines, space, and spirit. The quality of a work cannot be judged only by whether its local patterns are delicate, but by whether the whole piece breathes. If the layers are too crowded, the work becomes stifled; if the bladework is too exposed, its vitality disperses; if the subject remains superficial, the wood loses its spirit. He often regards woodcarving as a form of three-dimensional painting, and also as an arrangement of time: where to deepen, where to lighten, where to restrain, and where to release all require the creator to make judgments between experience and aesthetics.

Traditional craftsmanship is often misunderstood as the repetition of old forms. Lu Ting does not agree with this view. He believes that tradition is not a fixed pattern, nor an immovable rule, but rather the methods, standards, and spirit left behind through generations of artisans’ practice. Real innovation is not leaving tradition behind simply to appear new, nor is it moving tradition unchanged into the present. It is more like new branches growing from an old tree. The deeper the roots, the stronger the new growth. The same is true of woodcarving art: blade techniques, composition, and cultural meaning must not be lost, but subject expression, spatial relationships, and ways of viewing may all change with the times.

This understanding has kept Lu Ting’s work from being confined to table-top ornaments or interior furnishings. According to available records, he has participated in the restoration, design, and production of woodcarving works for multiple sites, including the Palace Museum, Leshan Lingyun Cave, Lingshan Brahma Palace, Hangzhou Leifeng Pagoda, the main venue of the Hangzhou G20 Summit, the main venue of the Beijing APEC Summit, Quzi Cultural Park, Sun Tzu Cultural Park, Mount Putuo Scenic Area, the Qianwang Mausoleum archaeological site, and Hengdian Station of the Hangzhou-Wenzhou High-Speed Railway. Once woodcarving enters such places, it is no longer merely an independent work to be viewed, but becomes part of architecture, space, and cultural narrative. It must correspond with its environment, respond to its theme, and withstand the test of long-term viewing in public space.

These project experiences have given Lu Ting a broader understanding of the industry. He has seen that if traditional woodcarving is to continue moving forward, it cannot remain only at the level of “good craftsmanship.” Today’s woodcarvers need to understand space, cultural settings, and the relationship between the work and the public. In the past, woodcarving often appeared in halls, temples, doors, windows, and furniture. Today, it enters museums, cultural venues, scenic areas, and important public spaces. As its position changes, so does the meaning it carries. Woodcarving is not merely decoration; it can become the cultural framework of a space and a path through which the public understands traditional aesthetics.

Lu Ting’s works have been collected by institutions such as the National Museum of China, Zhejiang Provincial Museum, China Woodcarving Museum, and China Woodcarving Art Museum. These works include West Lake Pearl, West Lake Scenery, West Lake Lotus, Magnolia and Prosperity, Qiantang River Tide, Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains, and Fishing Homeward Beneath the Pines. For a creator, having works enter museums means that his creations have moved from individual practice into the realm of public cultural preservation. Lu Ting does not exaggerate the significance of this. To him, collection does not bring a sense of completion, but a deeper sense of responsibility. Once a work enters the public eye, it will be viewed, compared, and studied over a much longer span of time. The creator must therefore be responsible for every layer within the work.

Beyond creation, Lu Ting also values the organization of experience. He has published articles including A Brief Discussion on the Fundamental Role of Traditional Painting in Dongyang Woodcarving Creation, Three-Dimensional Painting in Inlaid Woodcarving, Artistic Innovation Opens a Vast World: Multi-Layer Relief Carving Begins a New Chapter, and Techniques for Handling Shrinkage and Defects in Dongyang Woodcarving Materials. Much traditional craft knowledge has long relied on oral transmission, hands-on demonstration from master to apprentice, and personal understanding gained through repeated making. Lu Ting believes that such experience should not remain only in the hands; it should also be recorded and summarized. Only when practical experience is clearly expressed can later generations stand at a clearer starting point and continue forward.

As a Zhejiang Arts and Crafts Master, Full Senior Arts and Crafts Artist, and Representative Inheritor of the municipal intangible cultural heritage project “Dongyang Woodcarving,” Lu Ting prefers to view himself within the longer course of the industry. He does not understand the inheritance of traditional craftsmanship as keeping old things unchanged. Rather, he believes that each generation should offer its own response within its own time. What the previous generation leaves behind is technique, standard, and spirit. What later generations must do is bring these elements into new lives and new spaces, allowing them to continue to function.

During the interview, Lu Ting rarely spoke of grand goals. He spoke more about the grain of wood, the weight of the blade, how an image moves from a flat plane into layered space, and why young people must learn to sit still. He believes that the value of traditional craftsmanship is ultimately not proven by language, but by the works themselves. Titles, awards, and experiences may become words in an archive; what can truly pass through time are still works that can withstand close viewing.

Wood does not speak, but it remembers the direction of the blade. Lu Ting’s woodcarving journey over more than three decades has unfolded within this silent memory: from a frontline craftsman to a Chief Designer, from a creator of works to an inheritor of traditional craftsmanship, and from local woodcarving practice to a broader public cultural space. He allows people to see that Dongyang woodcarving is not a craft left behind in the past, but an art that is still breathing. As long as the blade is still willing to listen to the wood, tradition will not fall silent.