XIONG Li

(Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute, Jingdezhen 333403, Jiangxi, China)

Extended abstract:

[Background and purposes] As a Southwest China folk pottery exemplar, Yazhou pottery was transitioned from utilitarian to artistic value after the founding of the People's Republic of China. Through fieldwork, material analysis and archival research, the value deconstruction, reconstruction and reproduction via the DSR framework were analyzed. The findings indicated policy interventions, external artists, and artisan agency collectively transformed its forms, techniques, industry and cultural semantics, thus reconstructing multidimensional values (socio-cultural, aesthetic-economic, symbolic dimensions). Collaborative governance and design innovation pathways for sustainable heritage revitalization were proposed, advancing traditional craft theory and rural heritage conservation.

[Methods] This study employs a multidisciplinary approach combining document analysis, field investigation, in-depth interviews, and image analysis to systematically explore the value reconstruction of Yazhou pottery in Guizhou. Document analysis maps the research trajectory by synthesizing existing literature. Fieldwork and interviews with local artisans and inheritors provide firsthand insights into production processes and historical development. Through image analysis, artifacts were examined to identify evolutionary patterns in form and design. Together, these methods offered a comprehensive, multidimensional perspective on Yazhou pottery's value reconstruction, thus integrating theoretical, practical, oral historical and material dimensions.

[Results] Early Yazhou pottery was rooted in daily utilitarian needs, prioritizing functionality over aesthetics. Situated in a multi-ethnic convergence zone, the artifacts displayed both practical purposes and cultural symbolism through enriched ethnic folk traditions. According to the DSR (Driving Forces-State-Response) model, it is revealed that after the founding of the People's Republic of China, external drivers (policy guidance, market demands, non-local artistic interventions) and internal drivers (local artisans' design consciousness awakening) jointly catalyzed structural transformations. These manifested in formal patterns, technical craftsmanship, industrial configurations and cultural connotations, ultimately transcending utilitarian value. A multidimensional value system consequently was restructured, encompassing sociocultural significance, economic-aesthetic dimensions and symbolic representations through materialized expressions.

[Conclusion] As a material-cultural artifact rooted in rural society, folk pottery embodied sociocultural codes and collective aesthetic paradigms of specific regions. Within modernization's historical trajectory, Yazhou pottery negotiated cultural dialectics between tradition-modernity and locality-globality, exhibiting a paradigm shift from "practical rationality" to "aesthetic consciousness" in formal configurations. This evolution, marked by sculptural reconfiguration, transcended utilitarian limits through symbolic-semiotic expansion in cultural systems, while transitioning craftsmanship philosophy from functionalism to artistic ontology. By analyzing the value reconstruction of Yazhou pottery after the founding of the People's Republic of China, this study advances multi-stakeholder collaboration and design-thinking cultivation pathways were advanced, offering actionable frameworks for heritage revitalization. Paradigmatic breakthroughs were achieved in ethnic craft aesthetics through dual processes of cultural gene perpetuation and contemporary value rearticulation.

Key words: Guizhou Yazhou pottery; value reconstruction; changes in the ecological environment