Scope and Content
The collection documents Hongyi He’s method and philosophy behind her papercutting repertory through her biography, publications, and samples of her work. Papercuts created during a lecture/demonstration and interview at the Library of Congress on February 24, 2006, are also contained in this collection, along with several artifacts that were later donated to the American Folklife Center. While the collection is predominantly in English, the lecture/demonstration is in Chinese and English. Some publications are in Chinese varying between traditional and simplified Chinese.
The majority of the papercuts and publications illustrate He's in-depth interest in Chinese folk literature and Chinese ethnic groups. There are 27 small papercuts of animal characters and baby characters that are especially popular among Chinese living in rural areas. For many, these pieces represent Chinese culture and custom, wealth, and prosperity. There are also 15 small paper cuts of pandas made especially for children.
Oversize materials in the collection include: the Library of Congress' Asian Pacific American Heritage Month poster showing one of He’s paper cut pieces which was created during the lecture/demonstration; two papercuts of women’s hair decorations, one of the Miao people of Guizhou (blue), and the other of Tibetan origin (red); and twelve Chinese zodiac animals (mouse, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog, pig). Each zodiac animal papercut is red and each animal character is contained within a blue papercut background. According to the artist, these zodiac pieces are window decorations for Chinese New Year. The hair decoration and zodiac pieces were cut from a special type of paper that can be ironed, and the artist used special scissors to cut the delicate shapes of certain parts.