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A Study of the Inheritance Status and Direction of China's New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng: Centered on In-depth Interviews to Inheritors

In this paper, the New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng, China is studied as a living cultural heritage about their current status and future development. The literature review helps to understand the history of New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, the current situation of the inheritors. Then, in-depth interviews are made to the inheritors from four perspectives of internal environment, external environment, inheritance and innovations of New Year paintings to confirm further the status quo of New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town. Finally, the direction for transmitting and continuing such paintings is discussed. Results: Transmission focuses on spreading the craftsmanship. Due to the aging of inheritors, the loss of young talents and the weakness of the inheritors, it is proposed to look forward to the future of New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town combined with the talent cultivation model in colleges. As for continuity, it is proposed to take advantage of digital transmission means, digital platforms and marketing models to transmit these paintings in the consumer groups, market areas, sales patterns and marketing channels. Due to the transformation of the New Year Engraving Paintings in their cultural, aesthetic and social values, it suggests making the paintings best quality as the way for New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town to survive and advance in the future.


Introduction
During the New Year, Chinese people are accustomed to hanging decorative paintings in their homes to pray for good fortune and ward off evil spirits. These paintings are called New Year paintings because they are usually appreciated or worshiped throughout the year and replaced by new ones in the next year, which goes on year after year [1]. New Year paintings are a unique folk art form and the most popular custom and common art form among the Chinese people in traditional times. As one of the Chinese folk art forms, New Year Engraving Paintings are made by folk artisans and used by the general public. New Year Engraving Paintings have embodied national beliefs, customs, and other cultural characteristics with a long history, standing out from thousands of folk art forms in China [2].
The New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng, the originator of New Year Engraving Paintings, are rooted in the secular life of the people. The artistic characteristics of such paintings are closely related to the craftsmanship, and its entire production process has maintained the most primitive features from engraving, pigmentation to watermarking and color processing [3]. Lu Xun once praised New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng are not painted with powder, and the figures are not fawning. The colors are thick and rusticated, with the unique characteristics of New Year Engraving Paintings in the north [4]. However, New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng, receive little attention from the public and fail to be popularized in modern society. In the preliminary research, the author found that more and more researchers study New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, but most research was on the history, cultural value, and artistic style of New Year paintings. Its inheritance and development are important issues that can not be ignored and an urgent problem to be solved. In inheriting the paintings through the ages, the inheritors give play to their originality and present different features from their predecessors in technology or artistic techniques. Therefore, it is of great significance to understand the current status of inheriting the New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town and look forward to their future development by regarding New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town as living cultural heritage and studying the current status of inheritors as the subject of inheritance. Thus, in this study, the development status of New Year Engraving Paintings and their future development direction are explored based on the inheritors of New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng.
In this paper, literature review and in-depth interview methods were adopted. The libraries, museums, the Internet and other media were used to collect the literature and materials relating to New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town to investigate the historical context, inheritors. We then interviewed the inheritors using the in-depth interview method as qualitative research. Were corded text, sound, and pictures through filming, recording, and audio recording to understand the reality of the oral narrators' environment, attitudes toward New Year Engraving Paintings, and the existing problems. We discussed the inheritance status and direction of New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town based on the findings.

Formation and development of New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng
The Chinese New Year, which falls on January 1 of the lunar calendar, is the grandest festival in China. Many activities are associated with the Chinese New Year, among which one is to put up New Year paintings. As one of the folk art forms, New Year paintings carry people's expectations, hopes and longings [5]. In addition, incantations and pictures of gods to drive away evil spirits are also put up to pray for peace. These pictures are called door gods [6]. [ Fig. 1

Object and content of in-depth interviews
The object of in-depth interviews includes five persons, one national-level inheritor of New Year Engraving Paintings, two provincial-level inheritors, one municipal-level inheritor, and one county-level inheritor. The interview period was one month in March 2021, with two interviews to the inheritors' studios and units. The interviews lasted 60 to 90 minutes per time on average. In order to ensure the accuracy of the interview content, we obtained permission from the interviewees in advance and  Table 1] is a list of questions in interviews. [ Table   2] shows the schedule to interview the participants. [ Table 3] includes the information of interviewees. [

Interview results
In terms of the internal environment, A was invited by the government to collect and reproduce New  Table 4] shows the survey results of the internal environment.
[ Table 4] Survey results of the internal environment  Table 5] shows the survey results of the external environment.
[ In terms of the transmission of New Year paintings, the (1), (2) questions were not asked of D because he works at the Kaifeng Museum. A recruited three students from universities as apprentices, while B's apprentices are two sons and two daughters-in-law. C has 20 apprentices, and besides the family members, he recruits college graduates from Henan province every year. C's most important requirement for apprentices is love, followed by creative thinking, and E is not currently recruiting apprentices, so he is not asked the (1), (2). As for the brain drain, A believes that the main reasons are as follows. First, modern young people are not aware of the importance of traditional culture.  Table 6] shows the survey results of the internal environment.
[ Table 6] Results of New Year paintings inheritance  Regarding continuity, the first is the digital development, and now the consumer group of New Year Engraving Paintings from Zhuxian Town has shifted to niche groups such as collectors and researchers.
Its market area is also transformed from rural to urban, extending from inside to outside. The sales model has changed from workshop wholesale to gift orders and retail sales of tourism products, and the sales channel has shifted from offline to online. In this regard, we need to use digital communication Engraving Paintings as cultural and creative products is focused on capturing the psychology of the Chinese people to seek auspiciousness. Therefore, we need to explore the classic emotion-driven symbols after sufficient research and evaluation. In addition, custom-made New Year paintings need to continue to make innovations in terms of subject matter, genre and packaging.