掖县滑石雕刻:琢一品的非玉之玉

Pencil Stone Carving in Ye County——to Carve the First-Class Non-Jade Jade

在中国,玉是一个很包容的概念,一切美丽的石头都可称之为玉,很多石材原本并非软玉,但都在用玉石的方式加工、品鉴,也是非玉之玉。掖县滑石,就是一种著名的非玉之玉。掖县滑石也叫莱州玉,是一种以绿泥石为主要组成的彩石,因其色彩绿中泛黄且晶莹透明如冻状,常被称为＂绿冻石＂,又因其质软似滑石,也被误称为＂绿滑石＂。俗称滑石雕刻的莱州玉雕,使用的便是莱州玉。这种传承了2000多载的手工技艺在中国滑石雕刻工艺品中占据了极其重要的地位,更是北派滑石雕刻工艺的源流。讲起莱州玉雕的起源,

In China jade is a very inclusive concept in that all beautiful stones can be called jade. Many stones are not nephrite, but they are processed and appraised like jade and called the non-jade jade. The pencil stone in Ye County is such famous non-jade jade. Also called as Laishan Jade, it is a colorful stone mainly composed of chlorite. Due to its yellowish-green color and transparent shape like jelly, it was also named as the Green Jelly Stone. As it is as soft as the pencil stone, it was mistaken for the Green Pencil Stone. In ＇the Laizhou jade carving called the pencil stone carving, the Laizhou Jade is applied. With a history of over 2,000 years, the manual skill holds an important position in the Chinese pencil stone carving artifacts and constitutes the origin of the northern school of pencil stone carving craflwork.